When I first found out I was going to be taking statistics I was a little frightened. I am not horrible at math and I don’t hate it, but it’s not exactly my most favorite subject either. However, even though math isn’t my favorite thing in the world to learn, I did come away a better student after completing this course.

Obviously I learned formulas and procedures involving statistics but I also learned many more important concepts upon taking this course. For instance, I mentioned in another class reflection how I improved on my note taking skills and I also think I further improved on that while taking this course. Like most professors, the one I had for this course used mostly power point presentations to teach the material in the course. At the beginning of the semester, I used to write my notes word-for-word from the power point, however I quickly learned that this was taking too much time. By taking this course I further learned how to take more effective notes by shortening words or phrases but being sure I write down important information, like formulas, exactly how they are presented.

By taking this class I also learned the power of professors office hours. I am fairly certain the professor I had for this course was the first one I had visited during her office hours. To help me further understand the material covered in class, I started visiting her once a week during her office hours and it really helped me grasp the concepts covered. By going to her office hours, I learned how helpful this was and started visiting some of my other professors during their office hours too. Going to office hours really helped me understand information in this class and inspired me to use them for my other professors as well.

The paper above is one of the group papers I had to write for this course. The assignment for this project was to write two to three pages about a data set and then answer questions regarding the data using the knowledge gained from the course. Working with one other individual on this project was very helpful, so we could combine both of our understandings into one paper. Also, by using the notes I took in class and the further understanding I obtained by visiting my professor during office hours, it greatly helped me fulfill the requirements of this assignment.