Professor Z needs to allocate time among several tasks next week to include time for students' appointments.Thus,he needs to forecast the number of students who will seek appointments.He has gathered the following data:
Week # of students
6 weeks ago 83
5 weeks ago 110
4 weeks ago 95
3 weeks ago 80
2 weeks ago 65
Last week 50
-What is the forecast for this year using the last-value forecasting method?
A)22,000
B)20,000
C)18,000
D)15,000
E)12,000

Question

Professor Z needs to allocate time among several tasks next week to include time for students' appointments.Thus,he needs to forecast the number of students who will seek appointments.He has gathered the following data:
Week # of students
6 weeks ago 83
5 weeks ago 110
4 weeks ago 95
3 weeks ago 80
2 weeks ago 65
Last week 50
-What is the forecast for this year using the last-value forecasting method?
A)22,000 
B)20,000 
C)18,000 
D)15,000 
E)12,000

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

The last-value forecasting method assumes that the most recent observation is the best predictor of the future. Therefore, the forecast for this week would be the same as the number of students seeking appointments last week, which is 50.

To find the forecast for the entire year, we need to sum up the past six weeks' data: 83+110+95+80+65+50 = 483. Then we divide this by the number of weeks, which is 6, to get the average number of students seeking appointments per week: 483/6 = 80.5.

To find the forecast for the entire year, we multiply this average weekly demand by the number of weeks in a year, which is 52: 80.5 x 52 = 4,186.

However, since the question asks for the forecast using the last-value method, the answer is simply the most recent value, which is 50. Therefore, the best answer is B.

Professor Z Needs to Allocate Time Among Several Tasks Next