Statistics Major (B.Sc.) (54 credits)
Offered by: Mathematics and Statistics (Faculty of Science)
Degree: Bachelor of Science
Program credit weight: 54
Program Description
The program provides training in statistics, with a solid mathematical core, and basic training in computing. With satisfactory performance in an appropriate selection of courses, this program can lead to the professional accreditation A. Stat from the Statistical Society of Canada, which is regarded as the entry level requirement for a Statistician practicing in Canada. The students may complete this program with 54-57 credits.
Degree Requirements — B.Sc.
This program is offered as part of a Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) degree.
To graduate, students must satisfy both their program requirements and their degree requirements.
- The program requirements (i.e., the specific courses that make up this program) are listed under the Course Tab (above).
- The degree requirements—including the mandatory Foundation program, appropriate degree structure, and any additional components—are outlined on the Degree Requirements page.
Students are responsible for ensuring that this program fits within the overall structure of their degree and that all degree requirements are met. Consult the Degree Planning Guide on the SOUSA website for additional guidance.
Note: For information about Fall 2025 and Winter 2026 course offerings, please check back on May 8, 2025. Until then, the "Terms offered" field will appear blank for most courses while the class schedule is being finalized.
Program Prerequisites
Students entering the Major in Statistics program are normally expected to have completed the courses below or their equivalents. Otherwise they will be required to make up any deficiencies in these courses over and above the 54 credits of program courses.
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| MATH 133 | Linear Algebra and Geometry. | 3 |
Linear Algebra and Geometry. Terms offered: Summer 2025 Systems of linear equations, matrices, inverses, determinants; geometric vectors in three dimensions, dot product, cross product, lines and planes; introduction to vector spaces, linear dependence and independence, bases. Linear transformations. Eigenvalues and diagonalization. | ||
| MATH 140 | Calculus 1. | 3 |
Calculus 1. Terms offered: Summer 2025 Review of functions and graphs. Limits, continuity, derivative. Differentiation of elementary functions. Antidifferentiation. Applications. | ||
| MATH 141 | Calculus 2. | 4 |
Calculus 2. Terms offered: Summer 2025 The definite integral. Techniques of integration. Applications. Introduction to sequences and series. | ||
In addition, a student that has not completed the equivalent of MATH 203 Principles of Statistics 1. upon entering the program must consult an academic adviser. If a student is advised to take MATH 203 Principles of Statistics 1., this course has to be taken as a complementary course in the first semester, increasing the total number of program credits from 54 to 57.
Students are strongly advised to complete all required courses and all Part I complementary courses by the end of U2, except for MATH 423 Applied Regression. and MATH 523 Generalized Linear Models..
Students interested in the professional accreditation should consult an academic adviser.
Where appropriate, Honours courses may be substituted for equivalent Major courses. Students planning to pursue graduate studies are encouraged to make such substitutions, and to take MATH 556 Mathematical Statistics 1. and MATH 557 Mathematical Statistics 2. as complementary courses.
Required Courses (34 credits)
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| MATH 204 | Principles of Statistics 2. 1 | 3 |
Principles of Statistics 2. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. The concept of degrees of freedom and the analysis of variability. Planning of experiments. Experimental designs. Polynomial and multiple regressions. Statistical computer packages (no previous computing experience is needed). General statistical procedures requiring few assumptions about the probability model. | ||
| MATH 208 | Introduction to Statistical Computing. | 3 |
Introduction to Statistical Computing. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Basic data management. Data visualization. Exploratory data analysis and descriptive statistics. Writing functions. Simulation and parallel computing. Communication data and documenting code for reproducible research. | ||
| MATH 222 | Calculus 3. 2 | 3 |
Calculus 3. Terms offered: Summer 2025 Taylor series, Taylor's theorem in one and several variables. Review of vector geometry. Partial differentiation, directional derivative. Extreme of functions of 2 or 3 variables. Parametric curves and arc length. Polar and spherical coordinates. Multiple integrals. | ||
| MATH 235 | Algebra 1. | 3 |
Algebra 1. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Sets, functions and relations. Methods of proof. Complex numbers. Divisibility theory for integers and modular arithmetic. Divisibility theory for polynomials. Rings, ideals and quotient rings. Fields and construction of fields from polynomial rings. Groups, subgroups and cosets; homomorphisms and quotient groups. | ||
| MATH 236 | Algebra 2. 3 | 3 |
Algebra 2. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Linear equations over a field. Introduction to vector spaces. Linear mappings. Matrix representation of linear mappings. Determinants. Eigenvectors and eigenvalues. Diagonalizable operators. Cayley-Hamilton theorem. Bilinear and quadratic forms. Inner product spaces, orthogonal diagonalization of symmetric matrices. Canonical forms. | ||
| MATH 242 | Analysis 1. | 3 |
Analysis 1. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. A rigorous presentation of sequences and of real numbers and basic properties of continuous and differentiable functions on the real line. | ||
| MATH 243 | Analysis 2. | 3 |
Analysis 2. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Definition and properties of Riemann integral, Fundamental Theorem of Calculus, Taylor's theorem. Infinite series: alternating, telescoping series, rearrangements, conditional and absolute convergence, convergence tests. Power series and Taylor series. Elementary functions. Introduction to metric spaces. | ||
| MATH 323 | Probability. | 3 |
Probability. Terms offered: Summer 2025 Sample space, events, conditional probability, independence of events, Bayes' Theorem. Basic combinatorial probability, random variables, discrete and continuous univariate and multivariate distributions. Independence of random variables. Inequalities, weak law of large numbers, central limit theorem. | ||
| MATH 324 | Statistics. 1 | 3 |
Statistics. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Sampling distributions, point and interval estimation, hypothesis testing, analysis of variance, contingency tables, nonparametric inference, regression, Bayesian inference. | ||
| MATH 423 | Applied Regression. | 3 |
Applied Regression. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Multiple regression estimators and their properties. Hypothesis tests and confidence intervals. Analysis of variance. Prediction and prediction intervals. Model diagnostics. Model selection. Introduction to weighted least squares. Basic contingency table analysis. Introduction to logistic and Poisson regression. Applications to experimental and observational data. | ||
| MATH 523 | Generalized Linear Models. | 4 |
Generalized Linear Models. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Exponential families, link functions. Inference and parameter estimation for generalized linear models; model selection using analysis of deviance. Residuals. Contingency table analysis, logistic regression, multinomial regression, Poisson regression, log-linear models. Multinomial models. Overdispersion and Quasilikelihood. Applications to experimental and observational data. | ||
- 1
Students must take MATH 204 Principles of Statistics 2. before taking MATH 324 Statistics.
- 2
Students who have successfully completed a course equivalent to MATH 222 Calculus 3. with a grade of C or better may omit MATH 222 Calculus 3., but must replace it with MATH 314 Advanced Calculus..
- 3
MATH 236 Algebra 2. is an equivalent prerequisite to MATH 223 Linear Algebra. for required and complementary Computer Science courses listed below.
Complementary Courses (20-23 credits)
0-3 credits selected from:
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| MATH 203 | Principles of Statistics 1. | 3 |
Principles of Statistics 1. Terms offered: Summer 2025 Examples of statistical data and the use of graphical means to summarize the data. Basic distributions arising in the natural and behavioural sciences. The logical meaning of a test of significance and a confidence interval. Tests of significance and confidence intervals in the one and two sample setting (means, variances and proportions). | ||
Part I: 6 credits selected from:
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| COMP 208 | Computer Programming for Physical Sciences and Engineering . | 3 |
Computer Programming for Physical Sciences and Engineering . Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Programming and problem solving in a high level computer language: variables, expressions, types, functions, conditionals, loops, objects and classes. Introduction to algorithms such as searching and sorting. Modular software design, libraries, file input and output, debugging. Emphasis on applications in Physical Sciences and Engineering, such as root finding, numerical integration, diffusion, Monte Carlo methods. | ||
| COMP 250 | Introduction to Computer Science. | 3 |
Introduction to Computer Science. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Mathematical tools (binary numbers, induction,recurrence relations, asymptotic complexity,establishing correctness of programs). Datastructures (arrays, stacks, queues, linked lists,trees, binary trees, binary search trees, heaps,hash tables). Recursive and non-recursivealgorithms (searching and sorting, tree andgraph traversal). Abstract data types. Objectoriented programming in Java (classes andobjects, interfaces, inheritance). Selected topics. | ||
| COMP 251 | Algorithms and Data Structures. | 3 |
Algorithms and Data Structures. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Data Structures: priority queues, balanced binary search trees, hash tables, graphs. Algorithms: topological sort, connected components, shortest paths, minimum spanning trees, bipartite matching, network flows. Algorithm design: greedy, divide and conquer, dynamic programming, randomization. Mathematicaltools: proofs of asymptotic complexity and program correctness, Master theorem. | ||
| COMP 350 | Numerical Computing. 1 | 3 |
Numerical Computing. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Computer representation of numbers, IEEE Standard for Floating Point Representation, computer arithmetic and rounding errors. Numerical stability. Matrix computations and software systems. Polynomial interpolation. Least-squares approximation. Iterative methods for solving a nonlinear equation. Discretization methods for integration and differential equations. | ||
| MATH 209 | Fundamentals of Statistical Modeling and Inference. | 3 |
Fundamentals of Statistical Modeling and Inference. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Introduction to statistical modelling, likelihood principle and maximum likelihood estimation, Bayesian principle and Bayesian estimation, with emphasis on their application in statistical analysis and data science. | ||
| MATH 314 | Advanced Calculus. | 3 |
Advanced Calculus. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Derivative as a matrix. Chain rule. Implicit functions. Constrained maxima and minima. Jacobians. Multiple integration. Line and surface integrals. Theorems of Green, Stokes and Gauss. Fourier series with applications. | ||
| MATH 315 | Ordinary Differential Equations. | 3 |
Ordinary Differential Equations. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. First order ordinary differential equations including elementary numerical methods. Linear differential equations. Laplace transforms. Series solutions. | ||
| MATH 316 | Complex Variables. | 3 |
Complex Variables. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Algebra of complex numbers, Cauchy-Riemann equations, complex integral, Cauchy's theorems. Taylor and Laurent series, residue theory and applications. | ||
| MATH 317 | Numerical Analysis. 1 | 3 |
Numerical Analysis. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Error analysis. Numerical solutions of equations by iteration. Interpolation. Numerical differentiation and integration. Introduction to numerical solutions of differential equations. | ||
| MATH 326 | Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos. | 3 |
Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Linear systems of differential equations, linear stability theory. Nonlinear systems: existence and uniqueness, numerical methods, one and two dimensional flows, phase space, limit cycles, Poincare-Bendixson theorem, bifurcations, Hopf bifurcation, the Lorenz equations and chaos. | ||
| MATH 327 | Matrix Numerical Analysis. | 3 |
Matrix Numerical Analysis. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. An overview of numerical methods for linear algebra applications and their analysis. Problem classes include linear systems, least squares problems and eigenvalue problems. | ||
| MATH 329 | Theory of Interest. | 3 |
Theory of Interest. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Simple and compound interest, annuities certain, amortization schedules, bonds, depreciation. | ||
| MATH 340 | Discrete Mathematics. | 3 |
Discrete Mathematics. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Discrete Mathematics and applications. Graph Theory: matchings, planarity, and colouring. Discrete probability. Combinatorics: enumeration, combinatorial techniques and proofs. | ||
| MATH 350 | Honours Discrete Mathematics . | 3 |
Honours Discrete Mathematics . Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Discrete mathematics. Graph Theory: matching theory, connectivity, planarity, and colouring; graph minors and extremal graph theory. Combinatorics: combinatorial methods, enumerative and algebraic combinatorics, discrete probability. | ||
| MATH 378 | Nonlinear Optimization . | 3 |
Nonlinear Optimization . Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Optimization terminology. Convexity. First- and second-order optimality conditions for unconstrained problems. Numerical methods for unconstrained optimization: Gradient methods, Newton-type methods, conjugate gradient methods, trust-region methods. Least squares problems (linear + nonlinear). Optimality conditions for smooth constrained optimization problems (KKT theory). Lagrangian duality. Augmented Lagrangian methods. Active-set method for quadratic programming. SQP methods. | ||
| MATH 417 | Linear Optimization. | 3 |
Linear Optimization. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. An introduction to linear optimization and its applications: Duality theory, fundamental theorem, sensitivity analysis, convexity, simplex algorithm, interior-point methods, quadratic optimization, applications in game theory. | ||
| MATH 430 | Mathematical Finance. | 3 |
Mathematical Finance. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Introduction to concepts of price and hedge derivative securities. The following concepts will be studied in both concrete and continuous time: filtrations, martingales, the change of measure technique, hedging, pricing, absence of arbitrage opportunities and the Fundamental Theorem of Asset Pricing. | ||
| MATH 463 | Convex Optimization. | 3 |
Convex Optimization. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Introduction to convex analysis and convex optimization: Convex sets and functions, subdifferential calculus, conjugate functions, Fenchel duality, proximal calculus. Subgradient methods, proximal-based methods. Conditional gradient method, ADMM. Applications including data classification, network-flow problems, image processing, convex feasibility problems, DC optimization, sparse optimization, and compressed sensing. | ||
- 1
If chosen, students take either MATH 317 Numerical Analysis. or COMP 350 Numerical Computing., but not both.
Part II: 14 credits selected from:
| Course | Title | Credits |
|---|---|---|
| COMP 451 | Fundamentals of Machine Learning. 1 | 3 |
Fundamentals of Machine Learning. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Introduction to the computational, statistical and mathematical foundations of machine learning. Algorithms for both supervised learning and unsupervised learning. Maximum likelihood estimation, neural networks, and regularization. | ||
| COMP 551 | Applied Machine Learning. 1 | 4 |
Applied Machine Learning. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Selected topics in machine learning and data mining, including clustering, neural networks, support vector machines, decision trees. Methods include feature selection and dimensionality reduction, error estimation and empirical validation, algorithm design and parallelization, and handling of large data sets. Emphasis on good methods and practices for deployment of real systems. | ||
| MATH 308 | Fundamentals of Statistical Learning. | 3 |
Fundamentals of Statistical Learning. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Theory and application of various techniques for the exploration and analysis of multivariate data: principal component analysis, correspondence analysis, and other visualization and dimensionality reduction techniques; supervised and unsupervised learning; linear discriminant analysis, and clustering techniques. Data applications using appropriate software. | ||
| MATH 410 | Majors Project. 2 | 3 |
Majors Project. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. A supervised project. | ||
| MATH 420 | Independent Study. 2 | 3 |
Independent Study. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Reading projects permitting independent study under the guidance of a staff member specializing in a subject where no appropriate course is available. Arrangements must be made with an instructor and the Chair before registration. | ||
| MATH 427 | Statistical Quality Control. | 3 |
Statistical Quality Control. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Introduction to quality management; variability and productivity. Quality measurement: capability analysis, gauge capability studies. Process control: control charts for variables and attributes. Process improvement: factorial designs, fractional replications, response surface methodology, Taguchi methods. Acceptance sampling: operating characteristic curves; single, multiple and sequential acceptance sampling plans for variables and attributes. | ||
| MATH 447 | Introduction to Stochastic Processes. | 3 |
Introduction to Stochastic Processes. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Conditional probability and conditional expectation, generating functions. Branching processes and random walk. Markov chains, transition matrices, classification of states, ergodic theorem, examples. Birth and death processes, queueing theory. | ||
| MATH 462 | Machine Learning . | 3 |
Machine Learning . Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Introduction to supervised learning: decision trees, nearest neighbors, linear models, neural networks. Probabilistic learning: logistic regression, Bayesian methods, naive Bayes. Classification with linear models and convex losses. Unsupervised learning: PCA, k-means, encoders, and decoders. Statistical learning theory: PAC learning and VC dimension. Training models with gradient descent and stochastic gradient descent. Deep neural networks. Selected topics chosen from: generative models, feature representation learning, computer vision. | ||
| MATH 510 | Quantitative Risk Management. | 4 |
Quantitative Risk Management. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Basics concepts in quantitative risk management: types of financial risk, loss distribution, risk measures, regulatory framework. Empirical properties of financial data, models for stochastic volatility. Extreme-value theory models for maxima and threshold exceedances. Multivariate models, copulas, and dependence measures. Risk aggregation. | ||
| MATH 524 | Nonparametric Statistics. | 4 |
Nonparametric Statistics. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Distribution free procedures for 2-sample problem: Wilcoxon rank sum, Siegel-Tukey, Smirnov tests. Shift model: power and estimation. Single sample procedures: Sign, Wilcoxon signed rank tests. Nonparametric ANOVA: Kruskal-Wallis, Friedman tests. Association: Spearman's rank correlation, Kendall's tau. Goodness of fit: Pearson's chi-square, likelihood ratio, Kolmogorov-Smirnov tests. Statistical software packages used. | ||
| MATH 525 | Sampling Theory and Applications. | 4 |
Sampling Theory and Applications. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Simple random sampling, domains, ratio and regression estimators, superpopulation models, stratified sampling, optimal stratification, cluster sampling, sampling with unequal probabilities, multistage sampling, complex surveys, nonresponse. | ||
| MATH 527D1 | Statistical Data Science Practicum. 2 | 3 |
Statistical Data Science Practicum. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. The holistic skills required for doing statistical data science in practice. Data science life cycle from a statistics-centric perspective and from the perspective of a statistician working in the larger data science environment. Group-based projects with industry, government, or university partners. Statistical collaboration and consulting conducted in coordination with the Data Science Solutions Hub (DaS^2H) of the Computational and Data Systems Initiative (CDSI). | ||
| MATH 527D2 | Statistical Data Science Practicum. 2 | 3 |
Statistical Data Science Practicum. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. See MATH 527D1 for course description. | ||
| MATH 545 | Introduction to Time Series Analysis. | 4 |
Introduction to Time Series Analysis. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Stationary processes; estimation and forecasting of ARMA models; non-stationary and seasonal models; state-space models; financial time series models; multivariate time series models; introduction to spectral analysis; long memory models. | ||
| MATH 556 | Mathematical Statistics 1. | 4 |
Mathematical Statistics 1. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Distribution theory, stochastic models and multivariate transformations. Families of distributions including location-scale families, exponential families, convolution families, exponential dispersion models and hierarchical models. Concentration inequalities. Characteristic functions. Convergence in probability, almost surely, in Lp and in distribution. Laws of large numbers and Central Limit Theorem. Stochastic simulation. | ||
| MATH 557 | Mathematical Statistics 2. | 4 |
Mathematical Statistics 2. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Sufficiency, minimal and complete sufficiency, ancillarity. Fisher and Kullback-Leibler information. Elements of decision theory. Theory of estimation and hypothesis testing from the Bayesian and frequentist perspective. Elements of asymptotic statistics including large-sample behaviour of maximum likelihood estimators, likelihood-ratio tests, and chi-squared goodness-of-fit tests. | ||
| MATH 558 | Design of Experiments. | 4 |
Design of Experiments. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Introduction to concepts in statistically designed experiments. Randomization and replication. Completely randomized designs. Simple linear model and analysis of variance. Introduction to blocking. Orthogonal block designs. Models and analysis for block designs. Factorial designs and their analysis. Row-column designs. Latin squares. Model and analysis for fixed row and column effects. Split-plot designs, model and analysis. Relations and operations on factors. Orthogonal factors. Orthogonal decomposition. Orthogonal plot structures. Hasse diagrams. Applications to real data and ethical issues. | ||
| MATH 559 | Bayesian Theory and Methods. | 4 |
Bayesian Theory and Methods. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Subjective probability, Bayesian statistical inference and decision making, de Finetti’s representation. Bayesian parametric methods, optimal decisions, conjugate models, methods of prior specification and elicitation, approximation methods. Hierarchical models. Computational approaches to inference, Markov chain Monte Carlo methods, Metropolis—Hastings. Nonparametric Bayesian inference. | ||
| MATH 598 | Topics in Probability and Statistics. | 4 |
Topics in Probability and Statistics. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. This course covers a topic in probability and/or statistics. | ||
| WCOM 314 | Communicating Science. 2 | 3 |
Communicating Science. Terms offered: this course is not currently offered. Production of written and oral assignments (in English) designed to communicate scientific problems and findings to varied audiences Analysis of the disciplinary conventions of scientific discourse in terms of audience, purpose, organization, and style; comparative rhetorical analysis of academic and popular genres, including abstracts, lab reports, research papers, print and online journalism. | ||
- 1
If chosen, students can take either COMP 451 Fundamentals of Machine Learning. or COMP 551 Applied Machine Learning., but not both.
- 2
If chosen, students can at most one of MATH 410 Majors Project., MATH 420 Independent Study., MATH 527D1 Statistical Data Science Practicum./MATH 527D2 Statistical Data Science Practicum., and WCOM 314 Communicating Science..