SWUTC Workforce Development Initiative Description
Development of Transportation Statistics Distance Learning Course
University: Texas A&M University
Collaborating University: University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Principal Investigator:
TAMU:
Cliff Spiegelman
Texas A&M Transportation Institute
(979) 845-8887
UNL:
Larry Rilett
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
(402)472-1992
Funding Source: USDOT
Total Project Cost: $36,053 (SWUTC portion only)
Project Number: 600451-00032
Date Started: 7/1/13
Estimated Completion Date: 6/30/14
Initiative Summary
Abstract:
Transportation statistics play vital roles in drawing engineering and scientific conclusions. Although there are several introductory statistics courses offered at TAMU and UNL, they are less than ideal for transportation engineering students or professionals. In particular, many important methods/topics needed by transportation engineers are not even taught in those courses. In addition, the overwhelming majority of examples used in general introductory statistics courses are not transportation-related. Transportation engineering students as well as engineers at DOTs and research institutes currently lack access to useful statistics course tailored to transportation research areas.
Project Objectives:
A practice-based statistics distance-learning course for transportation engineering students and professionals will be developed. This course will be based on Statistics 658 (TAMU) that has been taught Distinguished Professor Spiegelman and CIVE 865 (UNL) that has been taught by Dr. Rilett. The transportation statistics textbook developed by Spiegelman, Park, and Rilett will be utilized in the course.
The course will cover topics important for transportation engineers that are not usually covered in general engineering statistics texts as well as some fundamental standard topics. The focus will be on actual transportation problems and will utilize a number of case studies based on SWUTC and MATC research. The course will cover a range of important transportation topics that are not usually covered in general engineering statistics courses. Topics include micro simulation, discrete regression, and design of experiments
The goal of this project is to offer this course, using distance-based methods, to students at UNL and TAMU in Spring 2014. In Spring 2015 the course will be made available to the consortium members of SWUTC and MATC. It will be also available to students participating in the USDOT Regional Centers Certificate Program. It is anticipated that there will be sufficient demand for the course to make it self-funding by Spring 2016.
An additional benefit to the proposed project is that the distance-based course material can potentially serve as a basis for developing modules targeted to practicing transportation professionals either through on-line applications or through short courses. However, this aspect will require additional funds and is not be covered in this proposal.
The course will be jointly taught by Distinguished Professor Cliff Spiegelman, and Distinguished Professor Rilett from the University of Nebraska. Dr. Spiegelman will teach on the A&M campus and Dr. Rilett will teach on the UNL campus in Lincoln. Technology will be used so that the lectures are seamlessly integrated. In that way, students benefit from the experiences of a statistics professor who has extensive experience in transportation and a transportation professor who has extensive experience in statistics
Implementation of Initiative Outcomes:
This course development was a collaborative effort between TAMU and UNL to provide a practice-based statistics distance-learning course for transportation engineering students. This course was based on Statistics 658 (TAMU) taught by Distinguished Professor Cliff Spiegelman and CIVE 898-Transportation Microsimulation & Statistics (UNL) taught by Dr. Larry Rilett. The transportation statistics textbook previously developed by the SWUTC and authored by Spiegelman, Park, and Rilett was utilized in the course.
The course covered topics important for transportation engineers that are not usually covered in general engineering statistics courses. Topics included microsimulation, discrete regression, and design of experiments. The focus was on actual transportation problems and utilized a number of case studies based on SWUTC and MATC research. The course was taught jointly at TAMU and UNL via web link during the Spring 2014 semester. During each lecture, Dr. Spiegelman was present in the TAMU classroom, with Dr. Rilett in the UNL classroom.
Impacts/Benefits of Implementation:
Students who completed this course will have an improved ability to analyze data, design better experiments, develop better data collection plans, and be able to make more insightful statements about experimental and observed transportation data. Equally important, they will also be able to communicate their results more clearly.
Materials from this distance-based course will serve as a basis for developing modules targeted to practicing transportation professionals either through on-line applications or through short courses.
Web Links:
Course Syllabus