Fall 2013 American River College Course: Introduction to Business Online Department & Number: Bus.

300 Lecture Hours: 3.0 Units: 3.0 Instructor: Professor Rachna Condos Office: Howard Hall Office Hours: by appointment Phone: 484-8531 Email: nagicor@arc.losrios.edu (preferred type of contact) Website: http://ic.arc.losrios.edu/~nagicor Student Learning Outcomes: Upon completion of this course, the student will be able to: ! Describe the economic, social, legal, and governmental environments in which business organizations operate. ! Identify and explain the major functional areas of business organizations including management, marketing, and finance. ! Apply business vocabulary for professional settings. ! Analyze current events in relationship to course concepts REQUIRED TEXTBOOK: ARC edition of Nickels: Understanding Business 10th 2013 by Nickels, McHugh ISBN: 9780077725556 The book itself is all that is required. While the bookstore shows a custom edition, this was done to get the best price for the students. If you can locate the 10th edition cheaper it is fine to purchase from that source. Ultimately, acquiring the book is your responsibility so if there are problems with your ability to get the book you must be willing to accept those natural consequences. Means of Communication: Because this is an online course, communication is primarily through e-mail and discussion boards. The subject line of ALL emails sent to the instructor should begin with the acronym of this course, Bus. 300section#(your course code), followed by your name and a brief description of the content. Example: If your name is Tina Young and your subject line would read: Bus. 300 #123456 Young. ! Please sign your emails as well since your email address may not clearly state your first and last name. ! All emails should be professional so do not use text messaging and incorrect grammar and spelling in writing the email.

I will return emails generally within 48 hours. The exception to this is on weekends where I may not get back to you until the following work day. Class Procedures: This class is different from traditional formats since you wont get to see me on a regular basis. This means that you must set out time in your schedule and be disciplined in staying on top of the material. In our D2l site there are practice quizzes to help prepare for the midterm and final, as well as a study guide and learning objectives per chapter. Orientation !" Login to the elearning d2l site for our class, http://d2l.losrios.edu!""You can access this from the ARC home page. " a. Go to System Check, located on the elearning login page, and make sure that you have all the right programs installed on your computer as well as the right browser. Make sure you're compatible and have all that you need to use all the tools from this site. b. D2l has just been upgraded and there are lots of changes. At this point, the recommendation is to use Firefox as your browser since there are glitches with other browsers especially Internet Explorer. " 2. Read the Syllabus. This is the most important thing you need to do. It has all the specifics of the course and you should save it to your computer and print it so you can refer to this when you have questions. Everything you need to know about this class is included in that document and I cannot emphasize this enough. " #" Take the orientation quiz, in d2l, scoring 90% or better You may take it as many times as necessary. " $" Post an introduction on the Discussion board and respond to someone else that you find something in common with based on their discussion board." The orientation is not part of the grades but it is required to stay in the class. Any student that does not complete it by Friday, Aug. 30th , may be dropped from the class. " Ongoing Class Procedures 1. Read the chapter in your textbook. 2. Complete the Progress Assessment for that chapter. When you feel like you know the information, take the quiz related to the chapter to test your knowledge. 3. Complete any other assignments on the d2l site as listed on the Announcements page. Grading: Chapter Quizzes Discussion Board Progress Assessments 1 10% 10% 10%

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Progress Assessments 2 Midterm Exam Final Exam Personal Reflection Project Final Project

10% 15% 15% 15% 15% 100%

Grading Scale: 90-100 A; 80-89 B; 70-79 C; 60-69 D; below 60 is an F. These are NOT points, they are based on percentages out of 100%. So, how many points an assignment is doesnt matter. Lets assume that you took all 20 chapter quizzes (which are approximately 200 points) and scored well on them but you didnt turn in the final project. That ONE project worth 100 points is worth the same (20%) than the combined value of all the quizzes. This is a fairly simple concept but sometimes students cant understand how they could do well on the quizzes but not do well in the class and that is because some assignments are weighted higher than others Cheating will not be tolerated!! If it occurs you will flunk that assignment immediately. A second incident of cheating will result in an F for that course, as well as repercussions that may include expulsion. Chapter Quizzes: Every chapter has a 10-12 question quiz associated with it. This is a quick way to gauge your knowledge of the chapter. The quizzes are timed (30 minutes) and can be taken multiple times, so you may take them as many times as you like until you learn the material and get your highest score. Progress Assessments: Throughout each chapter there are progress assessment questions (typically in a green box) that need to be completed. I have also included the questions within each chapter under content. These are designed to help you navigate the reading and make sure you are fully understanding the material. The questions and answers must be typed and placed in the Dropbox by the deadlines. Please put all the chapters due in ONE MS Word or PDF document. Midterm Exam: The midterm covers Chapters 1-10, and will be available from the beginning of class Sunday, October 13th. If you have not taken it you may be dropped from the class. Final Exam: The final exam is comprehensive thus all chapters are covered. It is 100 questions and has a 2 hour time limit. It will be available from Dec. 6th-15th . You may use your book and notes for the test, however, keep in mind that it is timed so if you go over your time limit your grade will be seriously affected. The exam can only be taken once. Both exams are 100 questions and have a 2 hour time limit. You may use your book and notes for the test, however, keep in mind that it is timed so if you go over your time limit

your grade will be seriously affected. And there is no way to get finish the exams if you have to constantly consult the book or your notes. Both exams can only be taken once.

Personal Reflection Paper: In many chapters I have included an article or a video to peruse,
and answer the following question. 1) What was the major point of the article/video? 2) Give an example of how you have seen it played out in life either experientially or something you have read/heard about. Minimum ! page, maximum 1 page each topic. Please use the attached handout to answer the questions. More information will be forthcoming. Due Dec. 1st, 2013

Final (Articles) Project: I believe that it is very important for you to see how the concepts you are reading about are manifesting themselves in real time out in the world. It is important that you find current material that is relevant to what you are learning about. Therefore, I would like you to find one article per chapter listed below that relates to any concept(s) within the chapters. You will list the date of the article (must be less than 3 months old), the Source (where was it published), Title, and a link to its online home. Assigned Chapters: Chapter 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, 18, 20. For each article, you will write 2 paragraphs ( approximately 1 page) that summarizes and connect the article to your textbook and the class. Your first paragraph will be a synopsis of the article summarizing and pointing out the 3-5 most relevant points followed by a 2nd paragraph that connects the material in the article to a specific concept in the text. Tell me how it relates to the chapter and why you chose it. The writeup should be adequate to cover the material in the article and show its relevance to the chapter concept(s) you are using it for. Limit yourself to one page on the writeup but be sure it is thorough. On the heading for the writeup page, Chapter name & number, date the article was written, the name of the source (with an active link), and the title of the article. Remember to use your own words. When you cut and paste or copy the words of the author, it is plagarism and considered cheating and will result in a 0 for the assignment along with disciplinary action. If you are quoting someone else, please use quotes to give them credit for their work. A sample of an article writeup is available under Contents.
Please use credible sources not just someones blog, but a publication that can be found outside of the Internet.

Here are some sources that may be helpful in finding articles: http://www.businessweek.com http://www.fortune.com (is also home to Money, Business 2.0, & Fortune Small Business) 4

http://www.forbes.com http://www.wsj.com (subscription needed) These sources are available for free through the ARC Library. If you link through the Library website, make sure you check with a Librarian on how to include a persistent link that will take me to the article, not to the Library website. The final project should be submitted to the dropbox in d2l. All the chapters should be included in ONE DOCUMENT and should be formatted as an M.S. Word or PDF document. The final project is due by Sunday Nov. 17th, 2013. Discussion Boards: There will be a limited number of discussion boards that you will be required to participate in. Your response should be clear and free of grammatical errors. This is not a chat room but a place to have thoughtful, meaningful interaction regarding the concepts and issues raised in our reading material. Your response to the question should include examples from the reading, secondary information to validate your point and/or your own personal experience if it applies. In addition to posting your thoughts, please also post your response to the student directly above you on the board. You may post to as many students as you like but be sure to post a response to the person who has posted right before you. This response to another student should be more than a simple declaration of agreement or disagreement; it should focus on how and why you agree or disagree with their comments. You may also add issues they may not have thought of or websites that would be helpful. Be polite and professional in your communication. If you miss the deadline dont bother posting because remember you cant have a discussion by yourself. There will be approximately 5 discussion board postings. There may be more as I find things that are interesting and that you may care to comment on.
The introduction is required to stay in the class but is not graded. Schedule: The number one reason that students give for taking an online class is flexibility. So with that in mind, I have created a schedule that is flexible but still has real, hard deadlines. The key is to manage your time wisely and I understand that some weeks you will have more time to devote to the class and some weeks less. You should still be checking in daily to review any announcements that have been posted.

SCHEDULE Week ending: Sept. 1st Sept. 8th Sept. 15th Sept. 22nd Sept. 29th Oct. 6th Recommended Chapters Chapter 1 Quiz Chapter 2 & 3 Quiz Chapter 4 Quiz Chapter 5 & 6 Quiz Chapter 7 Quiz Chapter 8 Quiz Assignments Due Intro Discussion Board Discussion Board: Why Businesses are Leaving Discussion Board: The Debt

Oct. 13th Oct. 20th Oct. 27th Nov. 3rd Nov. 10th Nov. 17th Nov. 24th Dec. 1st Dec. 8th Dec. 6th-15th

Chapter 9 & 10 Quiz Chapter 11 Quiz Chapter 12 Quiz Chapter 13 & 14 Quiz Chapter 15 & 16 Quiz Chapter 17 Quiz Chapter 18 Quiz Chapter 19 Quiz Chapter 20 Quiz

1st set of quizzes & Midterm due Oct. 13

Progress Assessment 1 Discussion board: Entrepreneurship Discussion Board: Buyer Behavior

Final Project Due Discussion Board: Segmentation Personal Reflection Project Due 2nd set of quizzes due Progress Assessment 2 Discussion Board: Financial Final Exam

Final Exam Available

*The syllabus may be changed based on the needs of the class.