Hello:

My Name is Joseph Jacobsen and I will be your instructor for this class.  I am very pleased to be a part of the Concordia University staff because I attended and graduated from the Sherman Park Site (before Mid Town).  I was in the first graduating class of Sherman Park.  Moreover, I was a single father raising my daughter, working full time, a jazz musician on weekends and completing my first degree.  Now, let me tell you something about my experience, education, contact information and rules about the course.

As a result of experience and education, I am the Management Facilities Engineer for the City of Milwaukee.  I have a rather large staff and budget. My “day job” work covers humanistic components like organizational development, group dynamics, organizational change, behavioral intervention programs, training programs, hiring, promoting and discipline. On the technical side, I work on things like systems integration, program and project management, optimization, energy management, digital control systems and generally staying up to date on the latest technological innovations in my industry.

Before coming to Concordia, I taught Power Engineering 1 and 2 at MATC for about six years. These two courses prepared students for an engineer’s license and had a condensed mathematics and physics component.  I have also taught leadership survival skills and managing modern organizations.  I am also an Operations Management consultant.  You will be introduced to some Six Sigma principals and decision-making in class.

I have a Ph.D. from Marquette University and my research interests are in operations research, statistical methods applied to the diffusion of innovations from science to society, mathematical modeling, comparing linear models to nonlinear models, decision sciences and planned performance modeling.  However, my passion in life is to assist others who want to assist themselves by higher education and improved performance.

I can be reached at jojacob@mpw.net or JJJACOBSEN@AOL.COM.  Go to my web site

http://www.cuw.edu/AdultEd_Graduate/ae/locations/milwaukee_midtown/jacobsen/index.html

and you will find a statistics and mathematics help section. This site is set up specific to the courses and will assist you with homework.  There are also advanced concepts for the adventurous, updates, links and files being added on a regular basis, stay tuned.  We will talk about this in detail during the first class.

Follow the module by having assignments completed that are due by the first session. You will need the TI83 or TI83+ graphing calculator (SPSS for Criminal Justice Statistics) to do the assignments for the first session.  Attendance is required.  If you miss an evening your final grade may be reduced. There is a penalty for late assignments and some “in class” activities are worth points.  I will give details the first evening.  Each session is packed with sequential information and if one session is missed, it will be difficult for the “advanced” student to catch up. If an EMERGENCY comes up, you must make arrangements in advance.  If you miss the first, last or more than one class you will take the course over again.

I look forward to meeting you

Resume