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Abstract:
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Long-term student projects can promote the kind of critical thinking required to apply statistical ideas and to integrate the various course components. In particular, students can be involved in all phases of a data-based study---conception, design, implementation, analysis, and reporting. Some instructors balk at student projects, however, often based on initial experiences that result in lame topics, dysfunctional groups, and projects that are either too ambitious or too narrow in scope. The key to avoiding such pitfalls lies in the way that we as instructors structure the administration of the projects and build in opportunities for our intervention and guidance. This talk will include suggestions for 1) multiple, graded, intermediate checkpoints, 2) guidelines and assessment criteria for all phases of the project, and 3) self- and peer-critique of student projects.
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