Instructor: Dr. Aaron K. Ball
Office:     332 Belk Building
Telephone:  227-2150

Email: ballaaron@wcu.edu

COURSE DESCRIPTION: An applied study of statistical tools and procedures commonly used for engineering and technical applications. This course will begin as a review of basic statistics, continue into the use of statistical procedures such as t-tests, ANOVA, and regression, and evolve into the design of experiments. The emphasis will be on the practical use of statistics and the interpretation and analysis of data. The focus will be on engineering applications and decision making for the product or process improvement.

PRE-REQUISITES: An undergraduate course in statistics and quality control.

REFERENCE TEXT: Design and Analysis of Experiments (5th EDITION) by Douglas C. Montgomery (ISBN #:0-471-31649-0). Note:  Other web resources will be used to support the class. You are not required to purchase a printed textbook for this course.

REQUIRED MATERIALS: 1. Computer with Microsoft Excel.
                    2. Engineering Pad (for some homework)
                    3. Two CD's, USB flash memory or other preferred media storage.

COURSE PURPOSE AND OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this course is to provide an opportunity for students to gain a working knowledge of applied statistical procedures for technical problem solving. Specifically, the course will provide students with an opportunity to attain the following objectives:

 1. Gain an understanding of acceptable methods for gathering
    and analyzing data;

 2. Develop a working knowledge of selected probability models and
    distributions;

 3. Gain a working knowledge of accepted experimental designs using
    appropriate statistical procedures;

 4. Apply tests of statistical hypotheses;

 5. Select and/or develop appropriate research designs;

 6. Apply statistical tools including screening, fractional factorials,
    ANOVA and Regression techniques for technical problem solving.

Accommodations for Students with Disabilities: Western Carolina University is committed to providing equal educational opportunities for students with documented disabilities.  Students who require disability services or reasonable accommodations must identify themselves as having a disability and provide current diagnostic documentation to Disability Services.  All information is confidential.  Please contact Disability Services for more information at (828) 227-2716 or 144 Killian Annex.

EVALUATION: Each student will be evaluated on four major areas of performance. These areas and percentages of the total grade are shown below:

       10 Problem sets @ 5% each = 50%
                              Midterm Exam 15%
                                          Project 20%
                                    Final Exam 15%

A ten point grading system will be in effect:

               A = 90 - 100
               B = 80 - 89
               C = 70 - 79
               F = 69 and below.

PROJECT: Each student or "team" (two students maximum) must complete an applied research project. This project will be completed during the last 4 weeks of class (but do not wait until week 12 to start). A preliminary proposal must be submitted for instructor approval by week 8. The project will be treated as equivalent to 4 weekly problem sets. A format guide for writing the final report is provided on the web site under "project".

PROBLEM SETS: It is anticipated that 10 problems sets will be assigned during the course. Some the problems sets will involve both hand calculations (calculator ok) and computer generated calculations. Where reasonable, use the following format for "writing up" problem sets:

I. Statement of the Problem (in plain English); [ 10 points]

II. Statement of the Hypothesis in null form with explanation; [10 points ]

III. Explanation and presentation of data; [ 10 points]

IV. Presentation of Results; [ 10 points]

V. Data analysis and summary. [ 60 points]

     WEEK TOPIC

 1          Course Overview, Variability,Descriptive statistics and Analysis, Excel Applications

 2          Exploratory Data Analysis (Graphical), Statistical. Tools; Normalized Data

 3          Probability & Distributions, Hypothesis Testing, T-Tests

 4          Independent, Dependent, and Paired T-Tests

 5          Hypotheses Testing ANOVA Procedures

 6          Fact. Designs ANOVA, Multiple Factors

 7          DOE (MID TERM Exam ASSIGNED)

  8          DOE, Proposal Presentations, and MID TERM EXAM Due

 9          DOE

10         Regression

11         Multiple Regression

12         Optimization

13         Optimization

14         Project Presentations AND FINAL EXAM

15         FINAL EXAM DUE and COURSE EVALUATIONS.