The Duke University Community Commitment states: “Because diversity is essential to fulfilling the university’s mission, Duke is committed to building an inclusive and diverse university community. Every student, faculty, and staff member —whatever their race, gender, age, ethnicity, cultural heritage or nationality; religious or political beliefs; sexual orientation or gender identity; or socioeconomic, veteran or ability status—has the right to inclusion, respect, agency and voice in the Duke community. Further, all members of the University community have a responsibility to uphold these values and actively foster full participation in university life.”
It is my goal for our learning environment to facilitate learning and intellectual development for everyone. To help accomplish this:
Duke University is a community dedicated to scholarship, leadership, and service and to the principles of honesty, fairness, respect, and accountability. Citizens of this community commit to reflect upon and uphold these principles in all academic and nonacademic endeavors, and to protect and promote a culture of integrity.
Remember the Duke Community Standard that you have agreed to abide by:
To uphold the Duke Community Standard:
Cheating or plagiarism on assignments, lying about an illness or absence and other forms of academic dishonesty are a breach of trust with classmates and faculty, violate the Duke Community Standard, and will not be tolerated. Such incidences will result in a 0 grade. Additionally, there may be penalties to your final class grade along with being reported to the University Judicial Board (undergraduates) or relevant Director of Graduate Studies (graduate students).
Please review the Academic Dishonesty policies here.
Occasionally datasets we are privileged to use in class are confidential and cannot be distributed more broadly. Further dissemination of such datasets, made available on Sakai, will be considered a violation of the Duke Community Standard. If you are unsure whether you can use a dataset for purposes beyond class, please ask me.
Much of the work assigned in class is collaborative. The individual case study must be completed independently. Group case studies are to be completed by groups. For other assignments, while you may talk about strategies for completing them with other students in the class, the work you submit must be your own individual work.
Important note: do not share your course materials with other students after completion of this course. Doing so will be considered a violation of the Duke Community Standard.
Referencing code: The web contains an enormous volume of code that you may find useful. You are welcome to make use of any online resources (e.g. StackOverflow), but you must explicitly cite your sources. Any recycled code that is discovered and is not explicitly cited will be treated as plagiarism. On the individual case study you may not directly share code with another student in this class, and on team assignments you may not share code with another team in this class (you are welcome to discuss the problems together and ask for advice, but you may not send or make use of code from another team).
Any live sessions, which would occur weekdays 2-3:15 EDT, will be recorded and made available on Sakai.
Each group case study will be completed by a team of 2-3 students. Groups will change throughout the semester to allow you the opportunity to work with more students. Groups should adhere to specified group policies.
STA 540 involves detailed analysis of case studies using current, relevant data. Each case study will involve two submissions by the group, as well as a peer review of another group’s submission. Case study submissions will involve an initial written report and an oral presentation to be viewed by the other teams. After receipt of comments from the instructor and classmates, groups will have the opportunity to submit a revised report.
Individual contributions to each submission will be assessed. Team members must provide these assessments in order to receive credit for an assignment. An individual team member’s grade will be modified if assessments indicate this is appropriate.
Each case study will have a page limit, and under no circumstances should font sizes less than 11 point be used, with the exception of labels in figures (and then only if they are still clearly legible to readers of all ages).
Students will be asked (on an individual, not group, basis) to provide feedback and comments on the case studies presented by other groups throughout the course. This feedback will be provided to the groups and will also be assessed as part of the course.
Each student will complete an individual project as part of the course. The individual project should use data that have not previously been used by the student in a project, and the analysis should be entirely the student’s own work. Any external resources used should be clearly documented. The student may use self-identified data or a resource provided by the instructor.
A number of smaller scale assessments will be administered, with the goal of honing skills in a variety of areas, including scientific communication, model evaluation, use and conduct of simulation studies, and interpretation of results. Additional topics will be added based on the course trajectory and student needs. These activities will provide a way to obtain individual feedback on important statistical science skills.
Your final grade will be comprised of the following.
| Component | % of Grade |
|---|---|
| Individual Assignments (including peer reviews) | 10% |
| Group case study 1 | 20% |
| Group case study 2 | 20% |
| Group case study 3 | 20% |
| Individual project proposal and part I | 5% |
| Individual project part II | 10% |
| Individual project final report (part III) and revision | 15% |
Each report will be graded based on the initial submission, with the ability to earn additional points based on the revised report.
Cumulative numerical averages of 90 - 100 are guaranteed at least an A-, 80 - 89 at least a B-, and 70 - 79 at least a C-; however, the exact ranges for letter grades will be determined at the end of the semester. The grade ranges may need to be shifted to the left, and when appropriate, students will be given guidance on interpreting grades when assignments are returned. The more evidence there is that the class is performing at the highest level, the higher the grade distribution will be.
If you are faced with a personal or family emergency or a chronic health condition that interferes with your ability to attend or complete classes, you should contact your academic dean’s office (undergraduate) or the Director of Graduate Studies in your department (graduate). See more information on policies surrounding these conditions at https://trinity.duke.edu/undergraduate/academic-policies/personal-emergencies.
Late work policy for assignments:
Regrade requests must be made within two days of when a report is returned. These will be honored if points were tallied incorrectly, or if you feel part of your report is correct, but it was marked wrong (these things do happen!). No regrade will be made to alter the number of points deducted for an issue. When a regrade request is evaluated, if new errors are identified, additional points may be deducted from the grade. The last day to file a grade change request is June 22.