Washington Statistical Society
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April 2006

Contents:



Herriot Award Nominations Sought

Nominations are sought for the 2006 Roger Herriot Award for Innovation in Federal Statistics.Ê The award is intended to reflect the special characteristics that marked Roger Herriot's career:

  • Dedication to the issues of measurement;
  • Improvements in the efficiency of data collection programs; and
  • Improvements and use of statistical data for policyanalysis.

The award is not limited to senior members of an organization, nor is it to be considered as a culmination of a long period of service. Individuals at all levels within Federal agencies, other government organizations, nonprofits, the private sector, and the academic community may be nominated on the basis of their contributions.

The recipient of the 2006 Roger Herriot Award will be chosen by a committee comprising representatives of the Social Statistics Section and Government Statistics Section of the American Statistical Association and the Washington Statistical Society. Roger Herriot was associated with and strongly supportive of these organizations during his career.

The award consists of an honorarium and a framed citation.

Joseph Waksberg (Westat), Monroe Sirken (National Center for Health Statistics), Constance Citro (National Academy of Sciences), Roderick Harrison (U.S. Census Bureau), Clyde Tucker (Bureau of Labor Statistics), Thomas Jabine (SSA, EIA, CNSTAT), Donald Dillman (Washington State University), Jeanne Griffith (OMB, NCES, NSF), Daniel Weinberg (U. S. Census Bureau), David Banks (FDA, BTS, NIST), Paula Schneider (U.S. Census Bureau), and Robert E. Fay III (U.S. Census Bureau) are previous recipients of the Roger Herriot Award.

For more information, contact Lawrence Cox, Chair, Roger Herriot Award Committee, 301 458-4631 or LCox@CDC.Gov.

There are no fixed requirements for the contents or format of nomination packages, but completed packages must be received by May 1, 2006.

Electronic submissions to Dr. Cox in MS-Word or PDF format are encouraged.

Alternately, nominations may be mailed to:

Lawrence H. Cox
National Center for Health Statistics
3311 Toledo Road, Room 3211
Hyattsville, MD 20782

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Retirement

Michael P. Cohen has taken early federal retirement.Ê He had been Assistant Director for Survey Programs, Bureau of Transportation Statistics, Research and Innovative Technology Administration, US Department of Transportation.Ê During his federal government career, he also worked for the National Center for Education Statistics and the Bureau of Labor Statistics.Ê Mike is the WSS financial auditor, historian, and representative to the Washington Academy of Sciences.

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2006 Washington Statistical Society Poster Competition

It is coming up on that time of year again for annual WSS Statistical Poster Competition. Every year the ASA holds a statistical poster competition for school children in grades K thru 12. In cooperation with the ASA, WSS awards local prizes for the competition for participants in the Washington DC-Metro Area. As with every year, we had a great turnout of posters and volunteers in 2005 and wanted to extend the invitation to anyone who would be interested in participating in this year's competition as a judge.

The local posters will be judged on Saturday, April 8th from 10 AM until 12:30 PM. Coffee, Snacks, and other refreshments will be provided. For more information, please contact Archana Joshee (Archana.Joshee@ey.com) or Ryan Petska (Ryan.Petska@ey.com) and we will provide you with the details.

The judging will be held at the Ernst & Young Building located at:
1225 Connecticut Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20036
(The Dupont Circle Metro Stop)
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SIGSTAT Topics for April to May 2006

April 26, 2006: Introduction to Enterprise Guide 4.1 for Statistical Analysis

The demo begins witha quick tour through the layout of Enterprise Guide (EG) as a menu-based interface to SAS procedures. Emphasis in this workshop will be on the statistical capabilities of EG. In particular, a set of data (put together using enhanced features of the query builder task) will serve as a case study for a forecasting exercise. The demo will show how code generated by EG can be customized, stored, and rerun, and custom reports saved with new Report Controls Integration. Linda Atkinson and Charlie Hallahan will be the speakers.

Linda Atkinson and Charlie Hallahan will be the speakers.

May 17, 2006: Univariate Detrending Using SAS: Some Examples and Applications

Detrending or filtering is an important tool for the macroeconomist studying business cycle fluctuations. Business cycles can be thought of as deviations of output from its trend. As such, detrending or filtering allows us to focus on the 'cyclical' properties of output. Four methods of detrending using SAS will presented: Beveridge-Nelson decomposition, Hodrick-Prescott filter, Baxter-King filter, and Unobserved Components. Two applications of univariate detrending are also presented. The first is to use SAS to generate 'stylized facts' of the business cycle and the second is to examine the consequences of detrending on the effects of monetary policy on output.

Ban Cheah, Westat, will be the speaker.

SIGSTAT is the Special Interest Group in Statistics for the CPCUG, the Capital PC User Group, and WINFORMS, the Washington Institute for Operations Research Service and Management Science.

All meetings are in Room S3031, 1800 M St, NW from 12:00 to 1:00 (note new time). Enter the South Tower & take the elevator to the 3rd floor to check in at the guard's desk.

First-time attendees should contact Charlie Hallahan, 202-694-5051, hallahan@ers.usda.gov and leave their name. Directions to the building and many links of statistical interest can be found at the SIGSTAT website, www.cpcug.org/user/sigstat/

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Email Delivery

If you did not receive this issue electronically and you have not notified us that you wish to receive the newsletter in hardcopy, please send your preferred email address to svm@mitre.org and indicate that this is your address for the WSS newsletter. To continue to receive the newsletter in hard copy, contact the WSS secretary at courtney.nreiser@census.gov or (301) 763-4142.

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Note From The WSS NEWS Editor

Items for publication in the June issue of the WSS NEWS should be submitted no later than April 25, 2006. E-mail items to Michael Feil at michael.feil@usda.gov.

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Click here to see the WSS Board Listing (pdf)
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