Education
PhD, Rice University
MS, University of Missouri-Rolla
BS, St. Mary's University
Biography
Rick Ott, PhD, mainly teaches statistics courses, including Introductory Probability and Statistics, Sampling Techniques, Mathematical Statistics, Design of Experiments, Statistical methods, Engineering Statistics and Regression Analysis. Student attendance and classroom interaction is a necessity in his courses.
Ott has a variety of experience in the STEM fields. He worked as a aerospace engineer at the Johnson Space Center on the NASA Space Shuttle Landing Team. This experience has allowed Ott to introduce real life experiences and applications to his statistics classes.
When in his office, Ott's door is always open. He will meet a student asking for help any time of the day or evening. He has met students as early as 7am or as late at 10pm. As long as a student is working hard, attending class consistently and participating in class, Ott will make time for that student. Many students will say he teaches more like a coach. He introduces the concepts, shows numerous examples and asks the class whether not the students have understood. If need be, he will aggravate students who skip class. He has no problem asking students why they missed class and telling them to not make that a habit of it.
Ott is lively, entertaining and describes himself as a loving, tough professor. He holds two-hour study sessions before tests in his introductory courses and involves students in a variety of research projects. Topics have included municipality surveys, medical treatment analysis, engineering quality control, public health issues and games of chance.