Instructor: David Walnut

Office: ST1, room 261

Phone: 703 993 1478 (voice);  703 993 1491 (fax)

email: dwalnut@gmu.edu

Office hours: TR 11:00am--12:00pm and by appointment.

Text L. J. Goldstein, D. I. Schneider, and M. J. Siegel, Finite Mathematics and its Applications (ninth edition)

Topics: The course will cover Chapters 5-7 in the text plus some additional material on Confidence Intervals.

The prerequisite for this course is a score of 70 or better in the Arithmetic section of the Math Placement Test. If (according to the registrar) you have not met the prerequisites for the course, your name will be flagged on my course roster and I will let you know. If this is the case, then you cannot stay in the course without either meeting the prerequisites.  Information on the Math Placement Test is available here.

The last day to drop this course without receiving an F is Friday, September 29, 2006. You will receive several quiz grades and your grade on the first exam before that date.  This grade should be a strong indicator of how well you will do in the course.  Use it to decide whether to stay or drop.  The student who is undecided about what to do should talk with me before deciding.

The course web page contains announcements and useful information for students in this course. Solutions to quizzes, exams, all handouts, and this syllabus will be made available in downloadable form. You are responsible for checking the web page periodically so that you will not miss important information.

A considerable amount of help is available to you. I particularly recommend the Mathematics Tutoring Center.  Information on this and other sources of help can be found here.

Homework. Included with this syllabus is a list of homework exercises for the course. Homework will not be collected but it is absolutely essential that you do the homework problems in a timely fashion in order to do well on exams and quizzes.  The assigned problems are representative of the test questions.

Quizzes. A short quiz (10--15 minutes) will be given each Thursday at the end of class, including weeks when we have an exam. The best 10 of your quiz scores will be counted. Your total quiz grade will count as 3/16 of your final grade. No make-up quizzes will be given under any circumstances.

Exams. Exams will be given on Tuesday, September 26, Tuesday, October 31 and Tuesday, December 5. Each exam will take the full class period. Each exam will count for 3/16 of your final grade. Makeup exams will not be given except in cases of extreme hardship and then only when the student has contacted me in advance. If I am not notified in advance, no makeup exam will be given.

Final Exam. There will be a cumulative final exam given on Thursday, December 14, 2006, 1:30pm-4:15pm in the same room where we have class. The final exam will count for 1/4 of your final grade. The grading scale is as follows. There will be no curve.

                                                A+: 99 +;     A: 92-98;   A-:  90-91;
                                                B+: 88-89;    B: 82-87;   B-:  80-81;
                                                C+: 78-79;    C: 72-77;   C-:  70-71;
                                                                    D: 60-69;
                                                                    F:    0-59.