Developing a Statistics Major at a Liberal Arts University

• Activity Number: 85
• Type: Contributed
• Date/Time: Sunday, July 31, 2011 : 4:00 PM to 5:50 PM
• Sponsor: Section on Statistical Education
• Author(s): Christopher H. Morrell*+ and Richard E. Auer and Elizabeth J. Walters
• Companies: Loyola University Maryland and Loyola University Maryland and Chick-fil-A, Inc.

Abstract

This paper describes the process that was used to develop a major in Statistics at Loyola University Maryland. For many years, the Mathematical Sciences Department at Loyola offered six concentrations from which students majoring in the Mathematical Sciences could choose. These included concentrations in Actuarial Science and Statistics. Each year about 25-30% of our majors graduated with one of these two concentrations. Due to the increasing number of students taking an AP Statistics course in secondary school and arriving at the University with a sense of Statistics as a viable career path, the department decided to pursue a major in Statistics. The statisticians in the department developed a rationale for the major, a broader set of course offerings, a curriculum for the new major, and a set of learning outcomes for the new major. The Actuarial Science and Statistics concentrations would now fall under the new Statistics major. The Statistics major had to be approved by various bodies at Loyola as well as the Maryland Higher Education Commission (MHEC). In the Spring of 2010, MHEC approved the major and, in the Fall of 2010, the department began to offer the Statistics major.