Difference between revisions of "Decision analysis and risk management 2015"

Revision as of 14:32, 22 January 2015

This page is about a course Decision analysis and risk management organised in 2015. For a course organised in 2013 and 2011, see Decision analysis and risk management 2013 and Decision analysis and risk management, respectively.

LIVE FEED FROM LECTURES in 2013 and 2011 (not a complete set)

Decision analysis and risk management (DARM)[1] is a course taught in the University of Eastern Finland (UEF) for Master's (MSc) Degree Programme in General Toxicology and Environmental Health Risk Assessment ToxEn.

Aims of the course

To give a good understanding and practical skills to perform, participate, and moderate open assessments and open policy practice using Opasnet.

The capability to act as an expert facilitator is the key objective in developing the course content. The purpose is to learn to effectively use facilitation to improve decision support.

In the course:

The student will learn about the fundamentals of decision analysis, the connections between assessments and societal decision making, and the role of decision making in a pragmatic context of improving outcomes. The student will learn to apply the scientific method and falsification in the context of an assessment, and know how to build an open assessment based on the requirements of societal decision making.

The focus is on how to convincingly exclude poor decision options rather than trying to find a theoretically optimal solution (e.g. with highest expected utility).

Course details

• Name: Decision analysis and risk management          
• Abbreviation: DARM
• ECTS-credits: 6
• Home page of the course: http://en.opasnet.org/w/Darm
• Degree Programme: ToxEn, Environment health risk assessment
• Teaching Language: English, with Finnish accent
• Offered for Students in Other Universities (JOO-opintoja): in 2011 Yes, in 2013 and 2015 unclear.

Contacts

• Organising Departments: Department of environmental science (in collaboration with the National Institute for Health and Welfare, THL)          
• Course Director: Jukka Juutilainen / Jonne Naarala     
• Teachers: Jouni Tuomisto 
• Contact Persons email: jouni.tuomisto(at)thl.fi     
• Registration for the Course: Wossikka     

Teaching / Learning Methods

• Lectures 14 h
• Checkpoints of exercises 3 h
• Seminars (practical work done presented by students): 6 h
• Course evaluation discussion 1 h
• TOTAL 24 h
• Distance learning: Own reading and homeworks 138 h

Lectures

See the Content and schedule table for timing, locations, topics and links to materials. One lecture and classroom exercise session is 2 * 45 min, and they are typically held without a break. The lectures and sessions start 15 min past full hour.

Study materials include e.g. PowerPoint files, scanned articles or book chapters, web-sites and web-documents. Due to copyright reasons, some of the materials are distributed through a password protected HEANDE-page. Passwords to HEANDE will be distributed during the lectures. In the end of the page there are some more links for further information.

Homework exercises

See Decision analysis and risk management 2015/Homework

Evaluation

Acceptable completion of the following tasks (details may change):

• Homework 1: Familiarise yourself to Mikko Pohjola's thesis and answer the questions. Due date: 14 Jan
• Homework 2: Learn to do basic tasks in open assessment. Due date: 20 Feb
• Homework 3: Read the introductory pages about Template:Opasnet training and write one question that you think needs clarification. Due date: 15 Jan
• Homework 4: With your pair, draft an assessment about the topic agreed on during the lecture. Due date: 13 Feb. Due date for final version: 20 Feb.
• Homeworks 5 to 10: Due date 20 Feb evening. For instructions etc. see Decision analysis and risk management 2015/Homework
• Seminar presentation 23 and 24 Feb.

Homeworks 1 - 3 are evaluated on a 0-1 scale, where 0 = not completed and 1 = completed.

Homeworks 4 - 10 and seminar presentation are evaluated on a 0-2 scale, where 0 = not completed, 1 = satisfactory, 1.5 = good, 2 = excellent.

Satisfactory completion of all homework exercise gives 10 points and score 1 (on a 1-5 scale). By doing better that satisfactorily in exercises 3-9, it is possible to get a higher score as follows:

Content and schedule

To prepare for the course: study these terms: Glossary#Terms in open assessment. This is important, because in open policy practice we use a lot of words that in everyday language may be synonyms or may have several different meanings. In this context, they have a specific meaning and they are NOT replaceable with similar terms.

14 h lectures, 3 h checkpoints of work progress, 6 h seminars, 1 h evaluation. Total 24 hours of on-site learning.

Distant learning: reading materials, lecture notes, homeworks 1-10. Total 138 h.

Help and guidance

Help requests or other comments can be posted on the course web-page or the exercise web-page by using the comment boxes on the end of the pages (no user account / log in required) or on the discussion pages.

See also

• Eracedu: related further education courses in Kuopio (in Finnish)
• Design for government course in the University of Helsinki
• Govlab

Content of 2011 course

Abbreviations: DA = decision analysis, RM = risk management, RA = risk assessment, RC = risk communication.

Links to additional DA materials

Links to additional RM materials

• IRGC risk governance framework
• Risk governance deficits - Analysis and illustration
• Risk assessment and risk management in regulatory decision making
• International Risk Governance Council
• The National Academies Press (publisher of e.g. "red book", "orange book", and "silver book")

Background information about other Decision analysis and risk management study programs in Europe and in USA is provided here: Decision analysis and risk management - background information

NOTE! On this page, there was a list of related further education courses in Kuopio (in Finnish).

Keywords

Risk assessment. Decision analysis. Bayesian theory. Open assessment. Risk management. Societal decision making.     

References

Related files