MATH 615 Course Tools
Introduction to all tools used in the course
Robin Donatello
2025-08-25
Class website
https://math615.netlify.app/
- Bookmark this page. You will be here a lot.
- Contains details on weekly topics, links to notes, assignments and additional materials
- Sometimes links will be broken. Typo’s happen. Notify me via Discord and I’ll get to it asap.
Class Website - Topic view
- One page per Topic
- These correspond to Modules in Canvas
- Ties together what we have learned, with what we are going to learn
- States the learning objectives for that topic
- Links to all learning and assessment materials for this topic
- MAIN PLACE FOR LINKS I don’t like to put links in multiple places because if I make an update then I have to remember to update all places, and that is error prone.
Class Website - Other tabs
- All slides, all homework
- Project overview & information
- Syllabus, help
- Reference materials
Practical Multivariate Analysis - 6th Edition
- The textbook is used for reading and learning content at a more in depth level than my overview slides.
- This will be used in Math 456, and is an excellent reference guide for further learning.
- If you’re curious, Afifi is a mentor of mine and invited me to participate. I used the 4th edition in grad school and really like teaching out of it. Royalties are about $100/year and is not why I require this text.
Canvas
- Assignment submission
- Grades
- Schedule, calendar, Due dates
- Recorded lectures
Google Drive
- Collaborative note taking
- Quizzes (Individual, and Group)
- Ongoing research project work
Discord
- Used for outside class discussions, meme sharing, homework help and general chatter.
- Your first place to ask code and homework based questions
- I will not answer most class-content based questions through email.
- Download either the phone app or the desktop app (I use both). This is mandatory.
- Do not rely on remembering to log in via the web browser. You will miss important notifications.
Lecture notes (slides)
- Stand alone lecture notes like these.
- Click on three lines in the bottom left to see options for exporting a copy in other formats.
Video
- Posted in Canvas
- Occasional pre-class learning content
- I will also record most class sessions
Statistcal Analysis Software
- The programming language R (syntax)
- Community written packages containing functions to do cool things
- Not used by itself in this class
- RStudio is the supportive working environment
- Integrates with other tools such as Quarto, HTML and Python
- R is accessed from within R Studio
You will download and install both as part of homework 0.
Closing Thoughts
- It may seem like a lot in the first week or two
- You will get used to it if you embrace it and view it as a learning opportunity
- If you fight it because it’s not what you’re used to, or are upset because there are “too many places to look”, you are not in for a fun semester.
- I am open to constructive feedback about course material.
MATH 615 Course Tools Introduction to all tools used in the course Robin Donatello 2025-08-25