[Cowystats] CO/WY ASA - Dr. Rubin - Jan 19th - plus much more.

Mon Jan 9 12:59:57 MST 2006

## Donald Rubin - January 19th, 5.pm., CSU-Fort Collins
## K-12 Student Outreach 
## Gertrude Cox Scholarship - Application Due April 1st.
## Volunteerism - Special Interest Group(SIG) 

## Donald Rubin - January 19th, 5.pm., CSU-Fort Collins

PRIMES Distinguished Lecture "Causal Inference Through Potential
Outcomes:  Application to Quality of Life Studies with Censoring Due to
Death and to Studies of the Effect of Job-training Programs on Wages"  This
will talk also be sponsored by the CO-WY Chapter of the ASA.

Before the lecture, there will be a formal reception from 4:10 - 5 pm.
Afterwards, people from  the lecture are welcome to attend a dinner at
a nearby restaurant. You will receive one more notice about
Dr. Rubin's  talk next week with room locations.  If anyone coming
from  the Denver or Boulder area
is interested in car-pooling, please send a note to pocernic at ucar.edu
and we can attempt to help coordinate rides.   For those outside the
Fort Collins area, we are hoping this will be a fun opportunity to
meet some of the statistics people up at CSU. Its not required but if
you think you are interested in dinner, please let me know.  

## K-12 Student Outreach 

Several members of the chapter met last week to
discuss possible K-12 outreach activities.  A workshop with chapter
members, teachers and people studying math education is being
considered.  The goal of this workshop would be to develop and
practice several talks aim at several levels of high school students.  
The presentations need to be engaging, have an education component and
show  why statistics is a great field.  With these presentations, we 
will then try and get ourselves invited into some schools.

If you are interested in learning more about this, send a note to
pocernic at ucar.edu.  At this time, no commitment is necessary.

## Gertrude Cox Scholarship - Application Due April 1st.

The American Statistical Association (ASA) would like to announce the
2006 Gertrude Cox Scholarship. The Gertrude Cox Scholarship is awarded
each year to encourage women to enter statistically oriented
professions. The ASA Committee on Women in Statistics and the Caucus for
Women in Statistics sponsor the scholarship.

Application is limited to women who are citizens or permanent residents
of the United States or Canada, and who are admitted to full-time study
in a graduate statistical program by July 1 of the award year. Women
entering or in the early stages of graduate training (M.S. or Ph.D.) are
especially encouraged to apply.

http://www.amstat.org/awards/index.cfm?fuseaction=cox-scholarship

## Volunteerism - Special Interest Group(SIG) 

The following is a note from  Jonathan Kurlander <jlk (at) mn.rr.com> on
the newly formed ASA group on volunteerism.  Since this
information is not available on any of the ASA websites yet, I thought it is 
worth include it in this newsletter.

############################

Dear All,

Let me start by wishing all of you a healthy and prosperous new year.
I am not one who typically becomes reflective at the changing of the
calendar. I often feel that we should reflect throughout the year and
appreciate our good fortune and progress and acknowledge our
shortcomings whenever we can.  I want to start out by addressing one
of my shortcomings (and only coincidentally it?s a new year):  I have
been remiss at keeping you informed on the happenings of this SIG.  I
hope to do a better job of that and I?ll start right here, by talking
about progress:  

Existing Projects:

Darfur Human Rights Assessment Study - ALMOST COMPLETED

The team has:

·         Worked with Benetech to nearly finalize the language in the
questionnaire 

·         Developed a sampling plan that Benetech will take to the field

·         Begun assisting Benetech with establishing an Internal
Review Board process to review the ethical issues in their work. 

The State Department has sent the team what appears to be the full
dataset from their Darfur survey and enough metadata for us to begin
to get busy with a re-analysis (which will be compared to some other
Darfur studies).   This will become a new SIG project and a team will
be put together soon. 

Congratulations to David Banks, who lead this effort and team members
Hormuzd Katki, Gary Shapiro, Paul Zador, Bill Seltzer, and Dylan Small
who all worked diligently to get this done!!! 

- The Graduate Education For Vietnam Task Force

The team has been keeping the discussion going with a large group of
people to work towards developing a curriculum for recommended use.
Several people have worked on a draft proposal and will be
distributing this for feedback as well as summarize the discussions
thus far. 

- The K-12 Curriculum Task Force

The team has been focusing on a proposal drafted by several people
from Truman University.  Several discussions have ensued and it was
suggested that the team refocus on studying existing curricula before
analyzing this proposal.  More discussion is needed on where this team
should focus its energies.  In the upcoming months, the team will be
shoring up the review process and coming out with a proposal for a
recommended curriculum or a method for achieving such. 

- Petitioning The Board for Creating the ASA Volunteer SIG - COMPLETED   

Congratulations to Shail Butani, Bob Starbuck and Rod Little!!! They
put together a thorough petition which was submitted in the fall to
the chair of the ASA Council of Sections.  This petition will be
reviewed by the board in early February. 

Projects in the Hopper:

1.      Innocence Project Statistical Support

Madeline deLone, executive director for the Innocence Project,
contacted us in the fall and has indicated a need for statistical
help.  We will be putting together a team to help support this
effort. 

2.      Election Irregularities

Mary Batcher has put together a team to begin this project and is
hoping to get this off the ground this month. 

3.      World Health

David Banks is going to be putting together a team to help assist the
WHO with their statistical needs.  This will be getting off the ground
very soon. 

4.      Volunteer SIG Website

We will be focusing on getting this website up and running within the
next couple of months.  We would appreciate suggestions for content.
Any input can be directed to me at jlk at mn.rr.com and Michael Last at
Michael.Last at gmail.com    

5.      Developing a Rapid Response Team

We will be assessing the need for a group of statisticians at the
ready to help out with an international crisis.  Whether it?s a
Tsunami, the Avian Flu, or any other unimaginable tragedy, this should
prove to be an interesting project and one that will need to cover a
lot of brainstorming.  All of you are welcome to join.  Contact me if
you have an interest in this project.  The project will conclude with
a written recommendation for putting together a team and efficiently
utilizing it. 

Finally, two things for you to do:

·         If any of you have interest in working on any of the
upcoming projects, please contact me.   

·         If you know someone who is interested in joining this group,
please have them contact me.  

Thank you for your interest in this group and let?s work hard to keep
the momentum going on these projects.  This is important stuff and we
can truly make a difference!!   

Best wishes,

Jonathan

-- 
Matt Pocernich
National Center for Atmospheric Research
Research Applications Laboratory
(303) 497-8312