Course Summary: So this course has been offered for the first time this year. It was taught by Dr. Pat Chow Fraser and Dr. Lyndsay Cartwright with 2 TAs: Cheryl Chow and John Paul Leblanc. It was a class size of about 50 and it had 1 tutorial and 1 core so a total of 4 hours. We didn't really have tutorials, all we had was 4 hours straight with a combination of lecture and tutorial all mixed together in those 4 hours. It was a night class that started from 6PM to 10PM but on most days, we started at 6:30. This course may not be offered next year because the current profs aren't available but if another prof could pick it up, it may still run. The content of the course was all about how to design an experiment and use a program called JMP to analyze results. We start off learning how to use JMP which helps you decide if a distribution is normal, if the variances are equal, and so on. JMP is just a tool for analysis.
Professor Rating: I would say that both profs can teach simply and to the point. They use examples to get the point across. I have felt that Dr. Pat could come across as a bit mean with her jokes sometimes so just a heads up. Otherwise, everyone was very helpful and very eager to provide feedback to help improve your learning.
Interest: I'm really into designing and I'm really into analysis so I loved this course. I really enjoyed what I was learning but some did not.
Easiness: At the end of every class, we had a 15 min open book quiz about what we just learned in class. The questions were usually very straightforward with no tricks as long as you clarified what you did not understand in class. There is no need to read the text but reading improved my overall understanding. Then there were 2 midterm tests, 4 assignments, and 1 final project (no exam). The tests were also open book and for this course, we had to bring our laptops to use JMP so we also used our laptops during tests/quizzes. The assignments required some effort and needed a lot of clarification since a lot of the questions were vague but I think they help reinforce what was taught in class. The final project was working in a group and designing an experiment about ANYTHING you wanted. We then had to collect data, analyze with JMP, and finally present this to the class. I thought it was a great learning experience and it was quite fun to do. Although I really enjoyed this course, I did not score a double digit in it. This course had a few issues with grading. But I would do it all over again even if I knew I was gonna get the same mark since I know I could bring a lot to the table in the years to come.
Course Outline: LS_3X03_outline_2013-14.pdf
