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M.S. in Statistics - Comprehensive Examination Plan

This degree program requires the successful completion of 32 semester hours of statistics and other course work chosen from the given listing of required and elective courses.  All courses in the program shall be selected under the direction of the student's assigned advisor. 

Requirements

• Complete 20 hours of core requirements: STA 471, 574, 585, 587, 673, 674, 675, 676.
   
• Complete 3 hours of other STA coursework selected from STA 472, 570, 571, 572, 575 and 608.

• Complete 9 hours selected in a coherent area of your choosing, subject to advisor and the Department's Graduate Operations Committee approval.  While a coherent area may consist of additional statistics or mathematics courses, students are encouraged to choose an area in forestry, biological sciences, environmental sciences, or other area of application of statistics.

Coherent area coursework must be appropriate for a graduate program.  Examples of coherent areas are presented below.  Please keep in mind that these are only examples and that students may construct a custom-made coherent area.  Courses used to build coherent areas may have prerequisites.
 

• Perform satisfactorily on a comprehensive final exam conducted by your advisory committee.

Examples of Coherent Areas

Coherent Area in Environmental Science	Coherent Area in Applied Mathematics
ENV 540 Conservation Biology (3)	MAT 516 Linear Algebra (3)
ENV 544 Landscape Ecology (3)	MAT 542 Wildlife Population Modeling (3)
ENV 595 Global Environmental and Climate Change	MAT 543 Wildlife Population Modeling Lab (1)
	MAT 563 Numerical Analysis

Coherent Area in Actuarial Science	Coherent Area in Applied Statistics
MAT 562 Interest Theory for Actuarial Science (3)	STA 472 Nonparametric Methods (3)
MAT 565 Actuarial Mathematics (3)	STA 571 Statistical Methods II (3)
MAT 567 Risk Theory (3)	STA 575 Applied Sampling (3)

Coherent Area in Forestry

Choose three courses (at least nine hours) from the following two areas, with at least one course in each area: (1) Ecosystem Science; and (2) Forest Management Sciences, Economics and Social Science.  The complete list of courses that satisfy these area requirements can be found under the description of Ph.D. emphases in Forestry in the current NAU Graduate Catalog.

Example:
FOR 503 Management Science Modeling for Multi-Resource Management (3)
FOR 525 Geographic Information Systems (3)
FOR 603 Forestry Biometrics (3)
 

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