MAC³ and Speech

Political Science, Math and Speech
To graduate with honors, students in the Honors Program are required to take one interdisciplinary seminar. A new IDS course to be offered in the Fall of 2008 will examine the presidential election. One of the units will focus on the Electoral College method of selecting the president and alternative plans that have been suggested. Students will be divided into groups and be given a set of data that includes results from four previous presidential elections, two elections that were quite close and two that were just the opposite. In addition to calculating the winner of these elections under each of four alternative plans, the students will also conduct statistical analyses to aid in their understanding of the implications of using each plan.

Speech Communication & Math

In our SPC 205 Public Speaking course, students must present a persuasive speech. A necessary component of this type of speech is audience analysis; it is important to research audience demographics so that the speaker can design his/her content to appropriately and effectively communicate the chosen topic. For instructional purposes, basic demographic data will be gathered and summarized in each section. For applied purposes students will be required to create a survey to use in class. They will then summarize and analyze the data before their persuasive speeches. In addition, demographic data gathered will be offered to MAT 120 (Probability and Statistics) instructors for use in their classes.