ECON 5 Online
Overview
Important Announcements for Fall 2024
Economics 5, Introductory Statistics for Economics, Business and Social Sciences, is available as a fully online course, with no on-campus meetings and no scheduled Zoom sessions. It is entirely asynchronous, but you need to complete assignments every week, so it is not self-paced. The online course covers all of the same topics as the traditional lecture course, including descriptive statistics, probability theory, inferential statistics and simple linear regression.
There will be three sections of the fully online version of ECON 5 in Fall 2024. The sections are numbered 831, 832 and 833. The corresponding CRNs are 71217, 71218 and 72822. All three sections are identical. Please register for whichever section has the most space available, or, if all sections are full, the one with the shortest waitlist. Typically, all sections of the online course fill up before the end of registration, so register as soon as you are eligible if you want to reserve a spot in the class.
There will also be one in-person section of ECON 5 in Fall 2024. That class will meet Mondays and Wednesdays from 2:10 to 4:25 pm. That course covers the same content, but uses a different textbook.
The online class will begin on Saturday, August 17, 2024. Officially, it will end on December 20, 2024, but I give students an extra week or so to finish any missing assignments or exams.
The online course will be using the 2nd edition of the Discovering Business Statistics textbook in Fall 2024, so be sure you obtain the correct edition.
Expectations
Please note that this is a 5-unit class. This means that a typical student earning an average grade should expect to spend an average of about fifteen hours per week over the course of the semester working on assignments for the class, including watching videos, reading the textbook, doing online homework and taking exams. You may be able to complete the assignments for some weeks in less than fifteen hours, but in other weeks it may require a bit more time. You will not need to spend time sitting in a classroom or commuting to campus, and you have lots of flexibility regarding exactly when you do the work each week, but the online class will take at least as much of your time every week as a traditional lecture class would.
Unlike many City Online courses, this 5-unit course begins on the same date as typical lecture courses, which, for Fall 2024, is Saturday, August 17, 2024. It will be possible to get a bit of a head start a week or so early with some parts of the course if you so desire. That is completely optional. The official ending date for the class is December 20, 2024, but you will be able to finish any time between December 13 and December 30, depending on what works best for your schedule. Before registering for the online course please ensure that your schedule will accommodate the workload and schedule requirements. Although this is an online course and you can work on it from any location at any time of day or day of the week, it is not self-paced. You will be required to submit assignments in a timely manner every week during the semester from August 17 to December 13.
Transfer Information
ECON 5 at CCSF is equivalent to similar courses offered in the CSU and UC systems, and is fully transferable to those universities. Even though the course is offered under the title of Economics, it transfers to CSU and UC as a Math class, and meets the General Education requirements for quantitative reasoning for both of those systems. For example, it is considered equivalent to STAT 2 at UC Berkeley. It also fulfills requirements for many AA, AS, AA-T and AS-T degrees at CCSF, including the AA-T degree in Economics and the AS-T degree in Business Administration.
Enrollment and Wait Lists
If all sections of ECON 5 are full and there is still space on the wait list, you can add your name and watch your CCSF email to see if it clears before classes start. If it does, you will have 24 hours to register before the spot is offered to the next student on the list. If it does not clear before Aug. 17, then do a Class Add Request on Aug. 17. Students will be admitted first-come first-serve with priority given to students who are on the official wait list as of the day before classes start.
If the wait list is full, keep checking every day because students often change their plans during the registration period and this may free up space for other students. Any spaces that become open on the official wait list will be available first-come first-serve. There will be no unofficial wait list. You will need to keep checking to see if you can get on the official wait list.
Once the class has started you must request authorization to add using myRam Portal. You will need to do this even if you were already on the official wait list but were not offered a spot before classes start. Once you have been authorized, please add as soon as possible so you do not fall behind.
There are three fully online sections of ECON 5 available in Fall 2024, sections 831, 832 and 833. The three sections are identical and it does not matter which one you enroll in. You can only be on the wait list for one section of ECON 5, but it doesn't matter because everyone on the wait list will be admitted on August 17, so there is no advantage to being on more than one wait list.
Although everyone on the official wait list for any of the online sections will be offered a space in the course (as long as you request authorization to add on August 17), the official wait list may fill up so you may need to consider other options. There is one other in-person section of ECON 5 offered in Fall 2024. Depending on your program, you may also be able to take Math 80, Math 80+Math80S, or PSYC 5, as alternatives. Check with your counselor to be sure.
Whether or not you are the official wait list prior to August 17 you will be able to request permission to add on myRam Portal on August 17. Permission to add may be granted to up to ten students who request it for each section, but priority will be given to students who were on the official wait list as of the day before classes start . If you do not get permission to add during the first few days of class then it is unlikely that you will be able to add and you should consider other options. If permission is granted be sure to add right away. It is very difficult to catch up in this class if you do not get started during the first week of classes.
Prerequisite
The prerequisite for this course is demonstration of algebra skills required for success in ECON 5. If you completed two years of high school algebra you qualify. You also qualify if you placed into Math 80+80S or higher at CCSF. Unlike Math 80+80S, ECON 5 does not require nor offer a Support Course such as Math 80S. All students take the same ECON 5 course and additional tutoring is available for students who need extra review of basic mathematical concepts.
Syllabus
You may preview a version of the course syllabus. This is the syllabus for Spring 2024 and is subject to change for later semesters. Any changes are likely to be minor, but some of the details will be slightly different. (For example, do not use the old class code for Khan Academy; wait for the new one when the new syllabus is published.) You may need to use your RAM ID to access the syllabus. See the last section on this page for RAM ID instructions if you are not familiar with it yet.
Contact Information
Professor:
David Pieper
Social Sciences Department
To get in contact before the class starts, send an email to dpieper@ccsf.edu. Once the class has started the preferred method of contact will be through the Canvas learning management system Inbox.
There is no guaranteed response time during Summer, Winter and Spring breaks, but if you do not receive a reply within 48 hours, Monday through Friday, please send your message again in case it ended up in my Spam folder. (For this reason, you should always use the Canvas Inbox to communicate with me after the class officially starts.)
Required Materials
Textbook
Please refer to the Syllabus section above for details about the textbook. Although that syllabus is for an earlier semester, the textbook information will not change.
Calculator
You will want to have access to a calculator for this course. No specific model is required and a calculator app on your phone will probably be fine. At a minimum you need to make sure you can calculate square roots and exponents (make sure it has a key labeled xy, yx or ^). Ideally, your calculator should also have an ex key. You do not need a calculator that is specifically designed for statistics, although it might be helpful. Every statistical calculator works differently, so you would need to learn how to use it on your own. We will cover how to do the statistical calculations using the tables in the textbook and on Excel, rather than on a particular statistical calculator.
Computer Access
Since this is an online course you will need access to a computer with internet access. There will be many videos to watch, so you will want to have sufficient internet speed to allow you to watch streaming videos.
Technical requirements for Hawkes, Khan Academy and Canvas are very simple. You simply need internet access and a browser. More details on technical requirements are available in the Syllabus (see earlier section).
You will find it much easier to do your assignments on a machine with a larger screen rather than on a phone.
We will also be doing assignments on Khan Academy, and some of those assignments are very difficult to do on a phone due to formatting issues.
If you do not have the necessary computer equipment, you can use the computer labs available at CCSF locations. You can also investigate the CCSF Library Technology Loan Program. You will need Microsoft Office installed for some assignments, so be sure to get a laptop computer and not a Chromebook.
Phone, Camera or Scanner, and Printer
Many assignments for this class will be far easier to complete on paper. Therefore, you will need a way to take a picture or scan of your work and upload it to Canvas for grading. Any phone with a camera app will work, or you can also use a digital camera or scanner.
You will find it much easier to complete this course if you have access to a printer that can print PDF and Word documents.
Software
For some assignments you will need access to a computer with Excel installed. You can install Microsoft Office on your personal device for free as a CCSF student. You are also welcome to use the computers at the CCSF computer labs, which have Excel installed. You will also find it much easier to view and print your assignments if you install Word on your computer.
Your assignments will be easier for me to grade on Canvas if you submit PDF files, so try to find apps for your computer and/or phone that can save in that format. You want to make it easy for me to grade your work I can be sure to give you the maximum points you deserve.
New to Online Learning?
There are some useful resources on how to succeed in online classes.
Need help? Check out the CCSF Online Course Support Center
Log-in instructions for Students
This course homepage will not be used once the class starts. Instead you will gain access through Canvas:
Go to the Canvas Logon Page. (The URL is https://ccsf.instructure.com)
Username: CCSF ID, examples: W12345678 or @12345678
Your Canvas password is your RAM ID password.
RAM ID instructions for students (Google Doc)
Canvas Support Hotline (844) 592-2198 available 24/7
If some disaster results in Canvas being unavailable, I will try to contact you by email, and I will also post an announcement here on this page with instructions. Otherwise, however, there will be no need to come back to this page once the class starts.
Disabled Students Programs and Services (DSPS)
The CCSF DSPS program is able to help you with any accommodations you may require.