Mathematical Statistics I - Distribution Theory

Sample space, random variable, expectation, conditional probability and independence, moment generating functions, special distributions, sampling distributions, order statistics, limiting distributions and central limit theorem.

This course is fundamental in the training of an actuary and is one of the first required courses needed to complete the program. I’m signed up to take it this fall with professor Qi Zhang. He seems like a really nice guy and was fairly relaxed about me using the international edition of the required text.

At this point, I have my book (it only cost $20!), I’m ready to start nerding out and kicking ass. I read over the chapter outlines e.g. 5.2 Sums of Random Variables from a Random Sample - this gets me excited.

However today I received a somewhat ominuous email from prof Zhang that served as a warning to the entire class:

Now I’m kind of scared. Maybe I’m in over my head? It’s been 6 years since I’ve done a triple integral on paper.

This seems to be the most dooming fact:

(5) Disclaimer: I understand that STAT 882 is a required course for many graduate programs other than statistics. However, being admitted to your program does not mean that you are ready for this class. You may want to explore other class options...

Other options? If I take STAT 880 then most likely I won’t complete the program in two years. If that happens my wife & I won’t be moving to Paraguay (yes, Paraguay, i.e. South America) summer of 2019. That would really put a wrinkle in our plan.

However this fact gives me hope:

(6) I did give a small portion of C's and D's in STAT 882 in the past (so did some other instructors). In order to get that kinda grade, you may have to score less than 50% in most exams, and show little evidence of learning.

Sounds like if I try hard enough and show evidence of learning I will be just fine!?

I’m definitely excited about learning the material. So I just need to score high enough on my exams etc to earn a C or better. Once again, only time will tell :)