Probability
CDA531 (MTH511) - Fall 2022

Instructor: Adam S. Sikora (Math Dept.)
Class meets: TuTh 2:00-3:20pm in Knox 20. Your attendance is expected.
My office hours: Tue 3:40-4:40pm.
Class announcements will be sent to you via email or UBLearns . Please check your UB email daily.

Text: Fundamentals of Probability, with Stochastic Processes, by Saeed Ghahramani. 4th, 3rd, or 2nd edition. However, there are many books covering similar material, eg.: very compact Schaum's Outlines of Probability
Suplemental Tex: D. Speegle, B. Clair, Probability, Statistics, and Data. A Fresh Approach Using R.
Prerequisites: Calculus I.
Tentative topics: axioms of probability, conditional probability, Bayes' Theorem, independence, random variables (continuous and discrete), distribution functions, expectation, variance, covariance, correlation, special distributions, Central Limit theorems, Elements of statistics (if time allows): inference, linear regression.

Preliminary Test Schedule: 1st week of October, 1st week of November, December 8th.
IDs will be checked. You are expected to take each test as scheduled, unless you have a documented medical or other documented valid reason. Contact me before taking an exam if you are seriously ill.

Quizzes: There will be quizes in class, posted at UBLearns, on most class days. Therefore, it it is recommended that you bring a laptop or a tablet to class. However, although less convenient, it is also possible to access UBLearns on a smartphone. No makeups will be given, but the lowest mark will be dropped without penalty. The first quiz is posted for practice already. Please take it on a divce you plan to bring to class, to make sure that you are ready for in-class quizzes.

Homework: Online at Gradescope and on Webwork. No late homework will be accepted.

Final grade will be based on

The total: 90% (total) guarantees A, 88% guarantees A-, 80% guarantees B, 70% guarantees C, 60% guarantees D. (B+,B-,C+,C- will also be utilized.)
The final grades may be curved. However, there will be no extra credit.
If your score is below 55% you may fail the course.

Academic integrity is a fundamental university value. Students caught cheating on exams, quizzes or HW will be penalized.

Incomplete: Incompletes will only be given for reasons beyond your control, serious illness. You must be passing the course to get an incomplete. University policy is that if you receive an 'I' grade (incomplete), then you are also assigned a default grade, which is the grade you have already earned averaged with a 0 on the remaining work. It is easy to see that even a good student will normally receive an 'F' as the default grade. This appears on your transcript, as 'I/F', until you make up the incomplete or 15 months elapse, when you would receive the default grade (you would receive the F in this example).
Students who received an incomplete in a previous class should not register for this class, but must file a petition form with the Math Department.