About the Workbook

This book supports the Data to Information course at the University of Austin. Data to Information is a core course, required of all students a UAustin in their first year. It has no pre-requisites and is designed so that all students, regardless of their background, can succeed. (Naturally, all students share one substantial aspect of their background: they were admitted to UAustin!)

Data to Information consists in part of non-technical readings about statistical thinking and how data can inform our understanding of the global situation in health, nutrition, and so on.

This Workbook is the basis for the technical component of the course, where students learn how to work with data and how to construct statistical models that let us extract the information that is latent in the data. Even though the course serves general students, the workbook uses sophisticated, professional-level data-science tools. Conventional wisdom says that using such tools is out of the reach of general students. But I have taken special care, and many years of revision, to minimize the gotcha’s that are the bane of many students computing lives. In addition, the statistical methods used—again, at a professional level—sidestep the detritis that has accumulated in conventional introductions to statistics.

You can judge for yourself! Enjoy!