New Sophia Courses: College Math and Chemistry

[ss20ts]

I wish UMPI accepts Math course for 3A

Take College Algebra from Sophia. It fills 3A. College Math won't fill it. They want students to have some math skills. Depending on your major, you may be surprised how often things from algebra and statistics come up. In business classes, you'll see this happen over and over.

[dfrecore]

I wish UMPI accepts Math course for 3A

Take College Algebra from Sophia. It fills 3A. College Math won't fill it. They want students to have some math skills. Depending on your major, you may be surprised how often things from algebra and statistics come up. In business classes, you'll see this happen over and over.

I have my BSBA, and I never had anything come up in any of my business courses that I needed College Algebra or Stats for.  The only course I remember having any type of "math" in was an UL Finance course, and they taught you the formulas you needed for it.  I actually took Stats as my very last course (even after the capstone).

For the business world, Excel gives you everything you need to do any kind of math/formula you might need.  I worked in "mathy" areas of Business for 10 years, including 401(k) plan administration, Stock Plan Administration, and Compensation Management, without a degree, and never had to use anything in any way related to College Algebra or Stats.  I can honestly say I think those courses are a complete waste of time.

[ss20ts]

I have my BSBA, and I never had anything come up in any of my business courses that I needed College Algebra or Stats for.  The only course I remember having any type of "math" in was an UL Finance course, and they taught you the formulas you needed for it.  I actually took Stats as my very last course (even after the capstone).

For the business world, Excel gives you everything you need to do any kind of math/formula you might need.  I worked in "mathy" areas of Business for 10 years, including 401(k) plan administration, Stock Plan Administration, and Compensation Management, without a degree, and never had to use anything in any way related to College Algebra or Stats.  I can honestly say I think those courses are a complete waste of time.

I used the algebra and stats in a few classes at UMPI, LSU, and Charleston Southern University's grad school. We all don't work in the compensation areas of employment. Lots of us have business degrees and use them in a variety of industries where we use algebra and stats on a daily basis. Certainly did when I was in construction. I've had a business degree for over 20 years and have used math in many of my jobs in different industries.

[Flelm]

For the business world, Excel gives you everything you need to do any kind of math/formula you might need.  I worked in "mathy" areas of Business for 10 years, including 401(k) plan administration, Stock Plan Administration, and Compensation Management, without a degree, and never had to use anything in any way related to College Algebra or Stats.  I can honestly say I think those courses are a complete waste of time.

I disagree to an extent. Currently I'm in a supply chain manager role. I also have my hat in QA a bit. For inventory management and planning, scheduling, etc, I use algebra all time. I don't use anything beyond basic arithmetic for purchasing. I admit stats I rarely used, but if you're going into QA roles or have an interest in Six Sigma it's absolutely useful to have the foundations. And Excel is only as good as your logic is, if you're doing anything beyond basic arithmetic formulas.

[dfrecore]

For the business world, Excel gives you everything you need to do any kind of math/formula you might need.  I worked in "mathy" areas of Business for 10 years, including 401(k) plan administration, Stock Plan Administration, and Compensation Management, without a degree, and never had to use anything in any way related to College Algebra or Stats.  I can honestly say I think those courses are a complete waste of time.

I disagree to an extent. Currently I'm in a supply chain manager role. I also have my hat in QA a bit. For inventory management and planning, scheduling, etc, I use algebra all time. I don't use anything beyond basic arithmetic for purchasing. I admit stats I rarely used, but if you're going into QA roles or have an interest in Six Sigma it's absolutely useful to have the foundations. And Excel is only as good as your logic is, if you're doing anything beyond basic arithmetic formulas.

I'm going to guess that most of the time, when you're going to need math in a job, they teach you what they need to know.  Just a guess, but I've never worked anywhere where they did not give me the info I needed to work in a spreadsheet, or told me how they computed things.  Since every business is so different, they want to teach you "their way" of doing things, not rely on you knowing a certain level of math to come up with your own way.

Just a guess.  Just my own experience.  But what you don't learn in school, you can learn on the job.  Whether you've taken math or not.

[Flelm]

I'm going to guess that most of the time, when you're going to need math in a job, they teach you what they need to know.  Just a guess, but I've never worked anywhere where they did not give me the info I needed to work in a spreadsheet, or told me how they computed things.  Since every business is so different, they want to teach you "their way" of doing things, not rely on you knowing a certain level of math to come up with your own way.

Just a guess. Just my own experience. But what you don't learn in school, you can learn on the job. Whether you've taken math or not.

I guess we have vastly different experiences with employers then. I don't expect to have to teach my production planner how to calculate work center capacities, rolled up yields, or process costs, given the correct inputs, and I would be embarrassed if I managed to hire someone that did not have that knowledge.

[dfrecore]

I'm going to guess that most of the time, when you're going to need math in a job, they teach you what they need to know.  Just a guess, but I've never worked anywhere where they did not give me the info I needed to work in a spreadsheet, or told me how they computed things.  Since every business is so different, they want to teach you "their way" of doing things, not rely on you knowing a certain level of math to come up with your own way.

Just a guess.  Just my own experience.  But what you don't learn in school, you can learn on the job.  Whether you've taken math or not.

I guess we have vastly different experiences with employers then. I don't expect to have to teach my production planner how to calculate work center capacities, rolled up yields, or process costs, given the correct inputs, and I would be embarrassed if I managed to hire someone that did not have that knowledge.

And so you think that if you hired someone with experience in that, they wouldn't know how to do that?  Or do you think that for someone with experience, they already know it, because they probably learned it on a prior job?  And for someone with zero experience in the field, you're going to have to teach them that because there may not have been a course that would teach them those exact things you want?

In my jobs, there has never actually been a course that taught what I needed to know.  There was no course in Stock Plan Administration (stock options were fairly new back then), so I had to learn over the years at different companies.  So with my first job, my boss taught me what I needed to know; and going forward, I already knew quite a bit and was taught anything I didn't already know.

There is not a college course for every possible thing someone might need to know for a job, and that's where on-the-job learning comes into play, or else prior experience.

And even if someone never takes a math course, I think they can learn plenty. I hadn't taken any math when I worked in business, and had zero trouble picking up what I needed to know.

[Flelm]

I guess we have vastly different experiences with employers then. I don't expect to have to teach my production planner how to calculate work center capacities, rolled up yields, or process costs, given the correct inputs, and I would be embarrassed if I managed to hire someone that did not have that knowledge.

And so you think that if you hired someone with experience in that, they wouldn't know how to do that?  Or do you think that for someone with experience, they already know it, because they probably learned it on a prior job?  And for someone with zero experience in the field, you're going to have to teach them that because there may not have been a course that would teach them those exact things you want?

In my jobs, there has never actually been a course that taught what I needed to know.  There was no course in Stock Plan Administration (stock options were fairly new back then), so I had to learn over the years at different companies.  So with my first job, my boss taught me what I needed to know; and going forward, I already knew quite a bit and was taught anything I didn't already know.

There is not a college course for every possible thing someone might need to know for a job, and that's where on-the-job learning comes into play, or else prior experience.

And even if someone never takes a math course, I think they can learn plenty.  I hadn't taken any math when I worked in business, and had zero trouble picking up what I needed to know.

I don't want to derail this thread, and I know I can't persuade you, but I will make one more post. If you want to continue this fruitless discussion we can take it to off-topic or somewhere else.

You keep moving the goalposts. Your original post said that "I can honestly say I think those courses [algebra and statistics] are a complete waste of time." (I also disagree that the areas you said are math heavy are actually math heavy, but I will not get into that argument and take what you say as true) ss20ts and I disagreed with you, giving examples where in our day to day business lives we use the fundamentals of those two courses.

You then went off on a tangent on how every company does things differently (true) and you learn things on the job (also true). However, algebra and statistics give foundational knowledge in math for certain aspects of the business world that I don't expect to teach on the job to a college graduate with a business degree (algebra at least, statistics I would expect an engineer or quality engineer to have knowledge in those aspects). I'm not going to spend my time training someone on basic math and other formulas they should know. I'm going to spend my time teaching them how to apply those things to their role. I'm glad that your bosses taught you those basics, but they knew your background when they hired you (I assume).

Just because you, in your career and experience, think you never needed these courses, they are a waste of time and you can learn everything you need to on the job doesn't mean that everyone in the business world thinks so, and I felt like if I just let your single opinion sit there other potential students might ignore these classes and be surprised in their careers. And ss20ts and I had different opinions and experiences that you seemed to take very personally.

[uncoolbilly]

I'm going to guess that most of the time, when you're going to need math in a job, they teach you what they need to know.  Just a guess, but I've never worked anywhere where they did not give me the info I needed to work in a spreadsheet, or told me how they computed things.  Since every business is so different, they want to teach you "their way" of doing things, not rely on you knowing a certain level of math to come up with your own way.

Just a guess.  Just my own experience.  But what you don't learn in school, you can learn on the job.  Whether you've taken math or not.

I guess we have vastly different experiences with employers then. I don't expect to have to teach my production planner how to calculate work center capacities, rolled up yields, or process costs, given the correct inputs, and I would be embarrassed if I managed to hire someone that did not have that knowledge.

And so you think that if you hired someone with experience in that, they wouldn't know how to do that?  Or do you think that for someone with experience, they already know it, because they probably learned it on a prior job?  And for someone with zero experience in the field, you're going to have to teach them that because there may not have been a course that would teach them those exact things you want?

In my jobs, there has never actually been a course that taught what I needed to know.  There was no course in Stock Plan Administration (stock options were fairly new back then), so I had to learn over the years at different companies.  So with my first job, my boss taught me what I needed to know; and going forward, I already knew quite a bit and was taught anything I didn't already know.

There is not a college course for every possible thing someone might need to know for a job, and that's where on-the-job learning comes into play, or else prior experience.

And even if someone never takes a math course, I think they can learn plenty. I hadn't taken any math when I worked in business, and had zero trouble picking up what I needed to know.

I built courses for Stock plan admins with OPtions Clearing Corp 25 years ago… so they were out there. I also needed “math” to lead the team that built OCC TIMS (theoretically integrated margining system) for calculating options.

No I didn’t have a college degree, yes I needed quality math skills, no excel couldn’t (can’t) support the data to process options, yes 25 years later the core of software calculations are still being used (even if they changed the cool name to something else).

The lesson is different companies and didn’t levels in a company will have different requirements (thus the reason I am getting a degree at 50 yrs old).




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[andromeda_galaxy]

I wish UMPI accepts Math course for 3A

Take College Algebra from Sophia. It fills 3A. College Math won't fill it. They want students to have some math skills. Depending on your major, you may be surprised how often things from algebra and statistics come up. In business classes, you'll see this happen over and over.

But this course looks better than College Algebra.