1. Teaching Statistics Courses in the Wave of Business Analytics
Zhixin (Richard) Kang
Lydia Gan
Department of Economics & Decision Sciences
University of North Carolina-Pembroke
The 47th SEDSI Annual Meeting
March 22-24, 2017
Doubletree by Hilton, Charleston, SC

2. Motivation
Business Analytics & Data Science -- next big trend in the near future
IBM
SAS
Walmart
Amazon.com
Business Analytics is expected to grow:
Evolving Business World
Faster & better decision making
Cost reduction
New products & Services

3. Background
Auburn University revamped Business Stat courses, renamed Business Analytics, & removed Calculus from their Business curriculum.
Arkansas Tech U offered a Business Data Analytics degree program. Partnered with ??? To develop curriculum.
“Should a traditional Business Statistics course be revamped to cover more business analytics related content?”
A task force was set up to address the question.

4. The Current Situation
Business Statistics serve as core courses in most business schools.
Other business courses: Accounting, Finance, Management, and Marketing use statistical tools for business analysis.
E.g. Marketing courses often use two-sample hypothesis testing to compare two different customer groups’ purchasing behavior
E.g. Operation management courses use a linear regression model to make forecasts.

5. The Relationship Between Statistics & Data Analytics
Business Statistics covers fundamental yet important statistical concepts, principles, & tools, which are used in data analytics.
E.g. Linear regression modeling lays a foundation for statistical inference in data analytics
Hypothesis testing is a key element in machine learning
Random sampling technique is used for pattern identification in data mining.
The traditional content of Business Statistics courses should be maintained.

6. The Suggested Reform
Higher level Business Statistics courses should apply more statistical tools in real data & real business scenario analysis.
E.g. Us of more case studies & analysis using software such as EXCEL should be a significant component in a Business Statistics course.

7. Moving Forward The taskforce concluded that
Business Statistics should be the prerequisite courses for courses in Business Analytics – if such a major/minor/certificate was to be offered at undergraduate level.
Due to its quantitative content at an advanced level & hiring freeze, we instead proposed a Business Analytics concentration in the MBA program.