WSS NEWS

News about activities of the Washington Statistical Society
A Chapter of the American Statistical Association

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March 2000

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Contents:

• Herriot Award Nominations Sought
• WSS Is Well Represented in This Year's ASA Elections
• Summer Program at Ohio State University
• Seminar Preview
• SIGSTAT for March, 2000
• Employment Opportunities
• Courses
• Seminars
• Area Meetings and Courses (Adobe Acrobat PDF file)
• Note From The WSS NEWS Editor
• WSS People

Herriot Award Nominations Sought

After the sudden death in May, 1994 of Roger Herriot, an Associate Commissioner for Statistical Standards and Methodology at the National Center for Education Statistics, the Washington Statistical Society, the Social Statistics and Government Statistics Sections of the American Statistical Association established an award in his memory to recognize individuals who develop unique approaches to the solution of statistical problems in federal data collection programs.

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;
• Improvements and use of statistical data or policy analysis.

The recipient of the 2000 Roger Herriot Award will be chosen by a committee of representatives of the Social Statistics Section and Government Statistics Section of the American Statistical Association and a representative of the Washington Statistical Society. Roger Herriot was associated with and strongly supportive of these organizations during his career. The award consists of an honorarium of $500 and a framed citation.

Joseph Waksberg (Westat), Monroe Sirken (National Center for Health Statistics), Constance Citro (National Academy of Sciences), Roderick Harrison (U.S. Bureau of the Census), Clyde Tucker (Bureau of Labor Statistics), and Tom Jabine (Consultant) are previous recipients of the Herriot Award.

The award is not restricted 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, from entry to senior, federal employees, private sector employees, or employees of the academic community, may be nominated on the basis of the significance of the specific contribution.

A nomination form can be obtained by contacting Fritz Scheuren at 202-261-5886, by fax at 703-549-1119, or e-mail scheuren@aol.com.

All nomination forms should be returned to the Roger Herriot Award Committee, c/o Fritz Scheuren, 1402 Ruffner Road, Alexandria, VA 22302. Completed nomination forms must be received by April 28, 2000.

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WSS Is Well Represented in This Year's ASA Elections

National Offices

Ron Fecso, of the National Science Foundation, has been nominated to run for Chair of the Council of Sections.

Connie Citro, a study director at the Committee on National Statistics, has been nominated to run for Vice Chair of the Council of Sections. Connie received her Ph.D. in political science from Yale University. She is currently serving as council of sections representative for the Social Statistics Section. She previously served as member and chair of the ASA Committee on Fellows, and as publications officer and program chair of the Government Statistics Section.

Phillip Kott, chief research statistician of the National Agricultural Statistics Service, has been nominated to run for Chair of the Council of Chapters. Phil received his Ph.D. in economics from Brown University. He has previously served as methodology section chair and president of WSS, and as associated editor of JASA.

Section Offices

Section on Business and Economic Statistics

Stuart Scott, mathematical statistician for the Bureau of Labor Statistics, has been nominated to run for Program Chair of the Section on Business and Economic Statistics. Stuart received his Ph.D. from Catholic University. He served previously as methodology chair for WSS.

Section on Government Statistics

Wendy Alvey of the Census Bureau, has been nominated to run for Program Chair of the Section on Government Statistics. Wendy has served as a member of the ASA Committee on the Office of Scientific and Public Affairs, the ASA committee on privacy and confidentiality, and as secretary of the Council of Sections Governing Board. She has also served as co-editor of the Survey Research Methods newsletter, the Government Statistics and Social Statistics Sections joint newsletter, and as publications officer for the Government Statistics Section. Finally, Wendy has also served as associate editor of the American Statistician. For the WSS, Wendy has served as co-editor of WSS News, as representative-at-large, and as chair of the WSS short course committee.

Suzanne Dorinski, mathematical statistician for the Census Bureau, has been nominated to run for Secretary/Treasurer for the Section on Government Statistics. Suzanne received her M.S. in applied statistics from Michigan State University. She previously served as social event coordinator for WSS and as membership chair for the Government Statistics Section.

Roberta Sangster, research psychologist for the Bureau of Labor Statistics, has also been nominated to run for Secretary/Treasurer for the Section on Government Statistics. Roberta received her Ph.D. in sociology from Washington State University. She is currently serving as a member of the ASA Survey Review Committee.

Lynda Carlson, Director of the Science Resource Studies Division at the National Science Foundation, has been nominated to run for Representative to the Council of Sections for the Section on Government Statistics. She previously served as Program Chair for the Government Statistics Section.

Stephanie Shipp, assistant division chief of the Housing and Household Economic Statistics Division of the Census Bureau, has also been nominated to run for Representative to the Council of Sections for the Section on Government Statistics. Stephanie received her Ph.D. in economics from the George Washington University. She has also served as program chair for the Social Statistics section, as chair of the ASA Committee on Women in Statistics, and as chair of the Cox Scholarship Committee. She also served as membership chair for WSS.

Health Policy Statistics Section

Social Statistics Section

Fritz Scheuren, senior fellow at the Urban Institute, has been nominated to run for Chair of the Social Statistics Section. Fritz received his Ph.D. in mathematical statistics from George Washington University. He has served as Vice President of ASA and in a multitude of other capacities at all levels of ASA and WSS.

B.K. Atrostic, of the Census Bureau, has been nominated to run for Program Chair of the Social Statistics Section.

Robert Santos, principal research associate for the Urban Institute, has also been nominated to run for Program Chair of the Social Statistics Section. Rob received his M.A. in statistics from the University of Michigan. He has also served as program chair for the Section on Survey Research Methods, and as a member of the following ASA committees Committee on Career Development (also as chair), Committee on Privacy and Confidentiality, and Committee on Minorities in Statistics (also as chair).

William Butz, Director of the Division of Social and Economic Sciences of the National Science Foundation, has been nominated to run for Publications Officer of the Social Statistics Section. Bill received his B.A. in economics from the University of Chicago, and continued his graduate studies there.

Gerald Gates of the Census Bureau, has been nominated to run for Representative to the Council of Sections for the Social Statistics Section

Paul Siegel, mathematical statistician for the Housing and Household Income Statistics Division---Small Area Estimates Branch, of the Census Bureau, has also been nominated to run for Representative to the Council of Sections for the Social Statistics Section. Paul received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago.

Section on Survey Research Methods

David Judkins, senior statistician at Westat, has also been nominated to run for Program Chair for the Section on Survey Research Methods. He received his M.A. in mathematics from Indiana University. David has served previously as the editor of the WSS newsletter.

Vicki Huggins, of Abt Associates, has been nominated to run for Secretary/Treasurer of the Section on Survey Research Methods.

Karol Krotki, Statistics Director for InterSurvey has been nominated to run for Publications Officer for the Section on Survey Research Methods. Karol received his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. He has previously served as Statistical Society of Canada's representative on the Board of the ASA, and as representative to the Council of Sections for the Section on Survey Research Methods.

Finally, Alan Tupek of the National Science Foundation, has been nominated to run for Publications Officer of the Section on Survey Research Methods. Alan received his M.S. from the University of Connecticut. He has served in several capacities, including web master, for the Government Statistics Section.

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Summer Program at Ohio State University

Week 1:

Sunday, June 18:

Applied Regression Analysis 8:30 am - 4:30 pm
    Instructor: Stanley Lemeshow, Ph.D.

Monday June 19-Friday June 23

Mornings: 8:30 am - 12:15 pm

Statistical methods and web-based technology in Clinical Trials
    Instructors: Stanley Azen, Ph.D. and Joyce Niland, Ph.D.
Applied Logistic Regression
    Instructor: Stanley Lemeshow, Ph.D.

Afternoons: 1:15 pm - 5:00 pm

Applied Longitudinal Data Analysis
    Instructor: David Kleinbaum, Ph.D.
Sampling of Human Populations
    Instructor: Paul S. Levy, Sc.D.

Week 2:

Sunday, June 25:

Reporting Statistical Results in Applied Journals 1:00 pm - 5:00 pm     Instructor: Tom Lang

Monday June 26-Friday June 30

Mornings: 8:30 am - 12:15 pm

Statistical Methods in Medical Research
    Instructor: Albert Hofman, M.D.
Applied Survival Analysis
    Instructor: David Hosmer, Ph.D.

Afternoons: 1:15 pm - 5:00 pm

Statistical Methods in Human Genetics
    Instructor: Ellen Wijsman, Ph.D.
Categorical Data Analysis
    Instructor: Gary G. Koch, Ph.D.

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Seminar Preview

This paper is the third in a series examining trends in the distribution of individual income and taxes based on a consistent and comprehensive measure of income derived exclusively from individual income tax returns. Statistics from 1979 through 1997 on the distribution of individual income, the shares of taxes paid, and average tax burdens, all by size of income, are presented, and analyzed. In addition, Lorenz curves and Gini coefficients have been estimated to assess trends in income inequality, both before- and after taxes, and some conclusions are made on these trends and the overall redistributive effects of the Federal income tax system.

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SIGSTAT for March, 2000

• March 8: Stata 6.0

  Stata is a complete statistical/econometric package with extensive data management capabilities and programming features, including a matrix language. Features are easily added through the programming language and many such additions are reported in the Stata Technical Bulletin, STB. It has built-in commands for panel data, time series data, survival models, count and binary data, and complex survey data. Hundreds of user-written commands are available for use with Stata and, with Stata's Internet features, obtaining these programs is easy. Bimonthly updates to Stata can easily be applied via the Internet. Stata performs very well on the NIST StRD certification tests.

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Note From The WSS NEWS Editor

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WSS People

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First posted February 29, 2000
Last modified June 2, 2000

Webmaster: Dan Jacobs, Maryland Sea Grant