... The hardest question for Delores Conway to answer is what she would be doing if she weren't a USC professor and director of the Casden Forecast. Her dual role creates a set of new challenges and enables her to explore her interests in computers, statistical analysis, economics and real estate. As a professor, her passion for seeking new ways to teach students how to apply statistical analysis to real-world problems led to her winning USC's award for excellence in teaching. Instead of giving her students data to study and, in essence, assigning them a research topic, she had them obtain their own data. Her method required her to meet frequently with the students about their concepts and created a lot of extra work for her. Even so, Conway said she found the approach worthwhile because the students were much more enthusiastic about their projects. Their results, she said, also tended to be more accurate because they were more invested in the outcome....
December 8, 2008