Course Description

Economics 3600 Course Description

Economics 3600 is the department's quantitative methods course that satisfies university requirements for quantitative attributes QB & QI. The text is Mathematical Applications for the Management, Life, and Social Sciences, 5th Edition from D.C. Heath and Company (ISBN: 0-669-39840-3). Also available on reserve at the Marriott Library for two hour check-out. You should be aware that the text is just a starting point. You should do well by attending class and actively participating online. Unlike with Principles courses where almost all of the learning takes place via the textbook and the function of the instructor is to highlight topics and set the pace, this is more of a skills course that requires patience and practice. Typically you will learn a lot by collaborating with your peers each week during our group work sessions.

Important note about Friday labs: the university will automatically enroll you in a Friday lab. Attendence is not required. These labs are available to help you get up to speed on using the computer and give you an extra opportunity to ask questions.

In this course we will use both the text and materials distributed online. The outline of the course is:

Linear Models & Special Functions
Matrix Alegbra
Linear Programming
Nonlinear Models

Quadratic Functions
Exponential & Logarithmic Functions
Topics in Finance

Calculus

Derivatives
Applications
Optimization

Probability

Probability Distributions
Sampling Distributions

Statistics

Sampling Procedures
Estimation
Inference

Econometric Models

Ordinarly Least Squares
Multiple Regression
Forecasting
Diagnostics

There will be quizzes, take-home assignments, three exams, and a required statistical/econometric paper. Since the paper is very important, you will have "release" time before the end of the semester to devote time to it. (More on this later.) In this course, you choose the grade you need based on a grading contract. Assignments are graded by our TA, who might be Jinyoung Soh, email: soh@econ.sbs.utah.edu, and me. If you have any problems with grading, you should submit a written reply as to why you think your grade should be changed. Good reasons do not include things like "if I don't get an A I lose my funding," or "I disliked your Pink Floyd tribute to the evils of institutional education", or "you mumble and go too quickly in class (which I do)."

This course will rely quite heavily on materials distributed via the web. Browsers often do not recognize changes to the pages, so you should reload this page each time you visit. Also make sure that if you are having any problems with the course including material, exams, or computer software, please contact me early. If you have access to a computer off-campus, you might enjoy surfing for Mathematical Software that is freely available for you to download. At Win98 you can also find nice mathematical shareware/freeware apps for doing statistics, calculus, and graphics. In class we will experiment with MAPLE (a mathematical package like Mathematica or Derive) and we'll learn how to use EXCEL (a common spreadsheet package) to do statistics. No prior experience is required.

All of us experience levels of math anxiety and one of my goals is to help you feel comfortable with the really very interesting topics you'll learn this semester. Feel free to come by my office (BuO 322) anytime, but it's a good idea to email me first: fowles@econ.utah.edu. My office hours are before and after our class.

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