Syllabus for Finite Mathematic

office hours:
by appointment only
I will be available in the classroom immediately after class. If you
need more time, please call me at my office and schedule an
appointment.

Course
This course is designed primarily for students in business,

Content:
economics, management, and the social sciences and life sciences. MA
103 builds on the algebraic skills of MA 100 while emphasizing
applications, modeling, and decision-making from business, social and
natural sciences, medicine, and other areas. It is a prerequisite for MA
171 and can be used as a Liberal Studies elective under Division III
Natural Sciences/Mathematics.

Text:
Finite Mathematics, Sixth Edition, Lial, Greenwell, Miller (Addison-
Wesley, 1998)

If you do not have a Thinkpad laptop computer, a graphing calculator
is needed for this class. I suggest getting a Texas Instruments TI-83.
If you have a laptop, go over to Learning Resource Center in the
basement of the Student Center and ask the attendant to install TI
Interactive.

Prerequisites:
MA 100 with a grade of “C” or better, or satisfactory score on the
Mathematics Placement Exam. Note that we will not be doing a lot of
review in this class. If you have not met the prerequisites, or if you
have not taken any math class for several years, please see me before
the end of the drop/ add period .

Grading:
Grades will be weighted according to the following:

Chapter Tests 50%
Quizzes 20%
Final Exam 30%

The final grade will be a weighted average of the above corresponding
to the following scale:

A 90 - 100
B 80 - 89.99
C 70 - 79.99
D 60 - 69.99
F less than 60

There will be no other grades given. Incompletes will be pursuant to
University policy.

Unless announced otherwise, all tests and quizzes are closed book and
closed notes. Calculators may be used and tables will be provided, if
needed.

Quizzes will be given once or twice a week, unannounced, and cannot
be made up under any circumstances. If you miss only one or two
quizzes, it will not significantly affect your grade. However, missing
most of them will. In most cases, a quiz will consist of one or two
homework problems and you are encouraged to work in groups of two
or three .

Chapter:
There will be at least four tests, usually at the end of each

Tests:
chapter. Tests will be announced at least one week in advance and you
will have one hour to complete it. The actual test dates will depend on
how fast the class is going. The Final Exam will be two hours long
and will cover the entire course. You must take the final exam to pass
the course.

Tests can be made up only for a good reason and you must provide
documented proof (i.e. note from doctor, subpoena, funeral
announcement, etc.) before you can take a makeup. If possible, please
notify me before the test if you are not going to be there. Except for
university related functions, I will solely determine whether or not the
reason that you have for missing a test is valid.

All makeup tests will be taken in the Mathematics Dept. office on the
first floor of West Hall. No tests will be returned until all makeups
have been completed.

Homework:
Homework assignments will be given, but not graded. If you want me
to go over a particular homework problem, email me the page and
problem number and I will go over it the next class. I will not go over
any homework problem unless you email it to me first!

As a general rule , you should spend two hours on homework for every
hour that you are in class. (This applies for all courses that you take in
college) Since this is a 4 credit hour course, You should spend at least
8 hours per week on reading and homework assignments. If you have
had an especially hard time with mathematics in the past, plan on
spending at least 12 hours per week for this course. I recommend that
you set scheduled times for this course (as well as your other courses)
and stick to this schedule. Plan your schedule now so that you do not
get bogged down later in the semester.

Attendance:
Other than the quiz grades, I will not be taking attendance for this
course. However, since you are making such an investment in this
course, it is to your advantage to put your best effort into learning the
material that is presented by attending class regularly and keeping up
on the homework. If you are not able to attend class due to work
commitments, child care, or some other reason, let me know and we
can work out some reasonable arrangement.

Academic Honesty:
You must do all of your own work. If you cheat, you will not
learn the material, and if you get away with passing this course by
cheating, you will have a very difficult and frustrating time in your
later courses. Also, you will be constantly looking over your shoulder
worried about getting caught, and that, in itself is not worth it. If you
do get caught cheating on a test or other assignment, you will get an
automatic F for this course, and you could be subject to other
sanctions. The bottom line is , if you cheat, you are really cheating
yourself out of time, money, and, possibly, your future career.

Disabilities: If you have a need for disability-related accommodations or services,
please inform the Coordinator of Disability Services in the Disability
Services Office at 1104 University Center (227-1737). Reasonable
and effective accommodations and services will be provided to
students if requests are made in a timely manner, with appropriate
documentation, in accordance with federal, state, and University
guidelines.

Course Outline

We will follow this outline. The numbers correspond to the chapters in the text.

1. Review of Algebra
a. Polynomials and rational expressions
b. Solving equations and inequalities
c. Exponents and radicals

2. Linear Functions
a. Equations of lines
b. Functional notation and definitions
c. Linear functions and models
d. Math models and curve fitting

3. Matrices
a. Definitions and applications for matrices
b. Solving systems of equations using matrices
c. Operations with matrices and finding inverses
d. Modeling and solving problems using matrices

4. Linear Programming
a. Graphing linear inequalities
b. Solving linear programming problems graphically
c. Modeling and solving linear programming applications

5. Finance
a. Simple and compound interest
b. Geometric sequences and annuities
c. Loans and amortization
d. Present value of future money

6. Probability
a. Notation, Venn diagrams, counting techniques
b. Probability of simple and compound events
c. Conditional probability
d. Bernoulli trials
e. Probability distributions of random variables ;
means ( or expected values )

7. Introductory Statistics
a. Graphical representations of data-sets, frequency tables
b. Numerical summaries of data -sets