AMSTATNEWS the Membership Magazine of the American Statistical Association •
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
June 2019 • Issue #504 AMSTATNEWS The Membership Magazine of the American Statistical Association • http://magazine.amstat.org 2018–2019 Academic Salary Survey ALSO: FY19 Budget Finalized; FY20 Budget Deliberations Underway 2018 Stewardship Report: A Big Impact on Data for Good JSM20198.5x11thankyousponsors.pdf 1 5/21/19 11:37 AM DENVER,COLORADO SPONSORS PLATINUM GOLD SILVER Want to support JSM 2019? Itʼs not too late. Find out more at www.amstat.org/jsmsponsors. AMSTATNEWS JUNE 2019 • ISSUE #504 features Executive Director Ron Wasserstein: [email protected] 3 President’s Corner Associate Executive Director and Director of Operations 5 Staff Spotlight Stephen Porzio: [email protected] Director of Science Policy 6 FY19 Budget Finalized; FY20 Budget Deliberations Underway Steve Pierson: [email protected] 9 Speed, One-Time Mentoring Offer Quick Connections Director of Strategic Initiatives and Outreach Donna LaLonde: [email protected] 10 Highlights of the April 5–6, 2019, ASA Board of Directors Meeting Director of Education Rebecca Nichols: [email protected] 12 2018–2019 Academic Salary Survey Managing Editor 19 Statistics Surveys: An Open-Access Review Journal Megan Murphy: [email protected] 20 2018 Audit Report for the American Statistical Association Editor and Content Strategist Val Nirala: [email protected] 24 Study Provides Insight into Emotions, Perspectives of School Counselors Production Coordinators/Graphic Designers Olivia Brown: [email protected] 26 Mentoring and Early Career Development Megan Ruyle: [email protected] Workshop: Takeaways Advertising Manager Claudine Donovan: [email protected] Contributing Staff Members Christina Link • Kristin Mohebbi • Kathleen Wert Amstat News welcomes news items and letters from readers on matters of interest to the association and the profession. Address correspondence to 2018–2019 Managing Editor, Amstat News, American Statistical Association, 732 North Washington Street, Alexandria VA 22314-1943 USA, or email amstat@ amstat.org. Items must be received by the first day of the preceding month Academic to ensure appearance in the next issue (for example, June 1 for the July issue). Material can be sent as a Microsoft Word document, PDF, or within an email. Page$alary 12 $urvey Articles will be edited for space. Accompanying artwork will be accepted in graphics file formats only (.jpg, etc.), minimum 300 dpi. No material in WordPerfect will be accepted. Amstat News (ISSN 0163-9617) is published monthly by the American Statistical Association, 732 North Washington Street, Alexandria VA 22314- 1943 USA. Periodicals postage paid at Alexandria, Virginia, and additional mailing offices. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Amstat News, 732 North Washington Street, Alexandria VA 22314-1943 USA. Send Canadian address changes to APC, PO Box 503, RPO West Beaver Creek, Rich Hill, ON L4B 4R6. Annual subscriptions are $50 per year for nonmembers. Amstat News is the member publication of the ASA. For annual membership rates, see www.amstat.org/join or contact ASA Member Services at (888) 231-3473. columns American Statistical Association 732 North Washington Street 28 STATS4GOOD Alexandria, VA 22314–1943 USA 2018 Stewardship Report: (703) 684–1221 A Big Impact on Data for Good ASA GENERAL: [email protected] ADDRESS CHANGES: [email protected] This column is written for those interested in learning about the world of AMSTAT EDITORIAL: [email protected] Data for Good, where statistical analysis is dedicated to good causes that ADVERTISING: [email protected] benefit our lives, our communities, and our world. If you would like to know WEBSITE: http://magazine.amstat.org more or have ideas for articles, contact David Corliss at davidjcorliss@peace- Printed in USA © 2019 work.org. American Statistical Association 31 STATtr@k Advice to a Novice Statistician ® STATtr@k is a column in Amstat News and a website geared toward people who are in a statistics program, recently graduated from a statistics program, The American Statistical Association is the world’s largest or recently entered the job world. To read more articles like this one, visit the community of statisticians. The ASA supports excellence in website at http://stattrak.amstat.org. If you have suggestions for future arti- the development, application, and dissemination of statistical cles, or would like to submit an article, please email Megan Murphy, Amstat science through meetings, publications, membership services, News managing editor, at [email protected]. education, accreditation, and advocacy. Our members serve in industry, government, and academia in more than 90 countries, advancing research and promoting sound statistical practice to inform public policy and improve human welfare. REGISTER TODAY departments 33 meetings Late-Breaking Session Focuses Professionals and students from academia, on Future of Statistics industry, and the government working in statistics and data science will gather and find unique opportunities to grow their influence, community, and knowledge. Register today at ww2.amstat.org/wsds. What’s Your Pastime? Do you have a hobby outside of work you would like to share? If so, let us know and we’ll feature it in an upcoming Pastimes of Statisticians column. Email Megan Murphy, Amstat News Late-Breaking managing editor, at [email protected] to Session Focuses on receive a short questionnaire to complete. Future of Statistics Return your answers along with photos of you Page 33 participating in your leisure activity and we’ll publish your story in an upcoming issue. View previous columns at https://magazine.amstat. org/blog/category/columnnews/pastimes. member news 35 People News 38 Awards and Deadlines 39 Section • Chapter • Committee News 46 Professional Opportunities Follow us on Twitter www.twitter.com/AmstatNews Join the ASA Community Coffee Break http://community.amstat.org Like us on Facebook Want to share pet pictures? Chat about a good book www.facebook.com/AmstatNews you’ve read that’s not stats related? Coffee Break is the Follow us on Instagram place for you! Join this discussion group if you’d like www.instagram.com/AmstatNews to get to know your fellow ASA members in a casual environment. Just log in and then opt in to comment: https://community.amstat.org/coffee-break. 2 amstat news june 2019 president's corner Statistics and Unintended Consequences any years ago, Allan Wilks spoke about appeared, its guest editors have been busy travel- the experiences he and Richard Becker ing around the country and fielding phone calls and John Chambers (co-developers of S, to discuss and clarify the issues with p-values, the Mthe progenitor of S-Plus and R) encountered among term “statistical significance,” and “alternatives to users. One of his remarks has remained with me all p-values.” these years. He was surprised at the ways S was But we may need more. How exactly are being used, ways they never imagined. “For exam- researchers supposed to implement this “new con- ple, one person called to say that S was incredibly cept” of statistical thinking? Without specifics, slow. All he wanted was an identity matrix and it questions such as “Why is getting rid of p-values so took a half hour. I was puzzled; the command hard?” may lead some of our scientific colleagues to diag(1000) takes a fraction of a second. It turns hear the message as, “Abandon p-values”—despite out that he was creating the matrix with for loops: the guest editors’ statement: “We are not recom- for (i in 1:1000) {for (j in 1:1000) mending that the calculation and use of continuous {if (i == j) then A[i,j]=1 else p-values be discontinued.” A[i,j]=0}}. It never occurred to us that people Brad Efron once said, “Those who ignore would use our package in this way.” statistics are condemned to re-invent it.” In his Recently, at chapter meetings, conferences, and commentary (“It’s not the p-value’s fault”) follow- other events, I’ve had the good fortune to meet ing the 2016 ASA Statement on P-Values, Yoav many of our members, many of whom feel quea- Benjamini wrote, “The ASA Board statement sy about the effects of differing views on p-values about the p-values may be read as discouraging the The Karen Kafadar expressed in the March 2019 supplement of use of p-values because they can be misused, while American Statistician (TAS). The guest editors— the other approaches offered there might be mis- Ronald Wasserstein, Allen Schirm, and Nicole used in much the same way.” Indeed, p-values (and Lazar—introduced the ASA Statement on P-Values all statistical methods in general) can be misused. (2016) by stating the obvious: “Let us be clear. (So may cars and computers and cell phones and Nothing in the ASA statement is new.” Indeed, alcohol. Even words in the English language get the six principles are well-known to statisticians. misused!) But banishing them will not prevent The guest editors continued, “We hoped that a misuse; analysts will simply find other ways to docu- statement from the world’s largest professional association of statisticians would open a fresh dis- ment a point—perhaps better ways, but perhaps less cussion and draw renewed and vigorous attention reliable ones. And, as Benjamini further writes, to changing the practice of science with regards to p-values have stood the test of time in part because the use of statistical inference.” they offer “a first line of defense against being The authors of the March 2019 supplement of fooled by randomness, separating signal from noise, TAS offered change. Yet, as the editors noted, “The because the models it requires are simpler than any voices in the 43 papers in this issue do not sing as other statistical tool needs”—especially now that one. … To us, these are all the sounds of statistical Efron’s bootstrap has become a familiar tool in all inference in the 21st century, the sounds of a world branches of science for characterizing uncertainty learning to venture beyond p < 0.05.” in statistical estimates.