[AISWorld] Statistical Concepts & Business Analytics Programs

[Zmud, Robert W.]

The entry of big data into organizations' competitive arenas has led to a steep increase in the demand for talented data analysts.  This, in turn, has fueled the rapid development of graduate and undergraduate business analytics programs.  Many colleagues offering business analytics courses have voiced concerns about the wide variance in the foundational statistical knowledge of their students.  Stated simply, many students lack a solid and applied understanding of statistical concepts.  While there are many reasons for such knowledge gaps, the ones must reasons most commonly mentioned are students' lack of a strong introductory statistics course or that too much time has passed since students took such a course.
For those of you facing such a situation, we would like to bring to your attention a new (2014) introductory statistics book by Dorit Nevo: Making Sense of Data through Statistics: An Introduction.  Dorit's book takes a fresh approach (conversational, rich with student-relevant contexts and examples, an effective blending of experiential exercises and Excel-based exercises, an emphasis on what is learned from a statistic and from executing a statistical procedure) to explaining foundational statistical concepts and techniques to graduate or undergraduate students.  Importantly, the text has been written in such a manner that students are able to grasp the covered materials largely on their own (i.e., as a flipped course).  Areas of coverage include: descriptive statistics, probability, probability distributions, hypothesis testing, ANOVA and regression analysis.
We believe that Dorit's text can effectively be used to develop, or to refresh, the statistical foundations needed for understanding concepts in more complex predictive business analytics and data manipulations.  The main objective of the book is to help readers develop a strong sense of data and the ability to turn numbers into insights.  Through friendly language, relevant examples and hands-on exercises, readers are guided through the preliminary steps of becoming strong data scientists.  The book can serve as a text for an introductory statistics course, a text for a refresher statistical module within a business analytics program, a supplementary text for a business analytics course, or as a self-study guide for students in business analytics programs.
As is the case with all Legerity Digital Press (www.ldpress.com<http://www.ldpress.com>) books, Dorit's text is a digital-only (PDF format) book available for purchase from the LDP website.  The entire book can be purchased for $19.95, or individual chapters can be purchased for $2.50 each.  Once purchased (and downloaded), the student can store the purchased material on multiple devices, where the material remains accessible for as long as desired.  Excel worksheets (referencing in-text examples and assigned problems) accompany most chapters.  The text, the Excel worksheets, and supplementary materials (Lecture Slides, Solutions Manual, Test Bank) are available from our website to instructors desiring to evaluate the text.
If you have any questions about the text, feel free to contact Bob Zmud (rzmud at ou.edu<mailto:rzmud at ou.edu>) or Dorit Nevo (nevod at rpi.edu<mailto:nevod at rpi.edu>).
If you have any questions about adopting the text and making it available to students, please contact Jana Williams (admin at ldpress.com<mailto:admin at ldpress.com>).
Cordially,
Bob and Samba

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