Washington Statistical Society
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May 2004

Contents:


Message From The President

May 17th is 50 years since the Supreme Court's landmark Brown v. Board of Education ruling outlawing segregated "separate but equal" school systems. Leading up to that decision and since then, there have been a series of studies done using statistics to clarify the effects on education of segregation and the success or failure of desegregation efforts. Statistical evidence has also been regularly used by both sides in ongoing court cases regarding busing, magnet schools, and in higher education affirmative action. I'd like to urge everyone to attend a fascinating seminar we have planned for May 17th where the use of statistics on this topic will be debated by researchers with very different viewpoints. Our two discussants will be the current Commissioner of NCES, Bob Lerner, and the first Commissioner, Emerson Elliott. We will have refreshments following the session so plan on staying a bit longer than usual to talk with the participants. While we will videoconference this session, you may want to attend this session in person. More details can be found inside this newsletter. If you enjoyed our October seminar on "40 Years Since the I Have A Dream Speech, The Role of Statistics in Achieving the Dream," you are sure to like this one as well.

David Marker

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2004 Annual Dinner
June 15, 2004

The WSS Annual Dinner will be held Tuesday, June 15, at Maggiano's Little Italy Restaurant located on Wisconsin Avenue in Washington, DC across the street from the Mazza Gallerie. Please see the flyer (pdf) for details and a reservation form.

This is a great opportunity to join with friends, meet colleagues, and make new acquaintances!

All are invited. We look forward to seeing you there!

Speaker: Dr. Alan Zaslavsky, Professor of Health Care Policy (Statistics) at the Harvard University Medical School. Dr. Zaslavsky is the second annual recipient of the Gertrude M. Cox Statistics Award, which recognizes a statistician making significant contributions to statistical practice. The award is made possible by funding from RTI International.

Tuesday, June 15, 2004 -- 5:30 to 8:30 pm

Maggiano's Little Italy
533 Wisconsin Ave, N.W.
202-966-5500
Red Line Friendship Heights
Validated rates for the Chevy Chase Pavilion parking garage

Dinner Includes: Mozzarella Marinara, Parmesan Garlic Bread, Spinach and Italian Salads, Four Cheese Ravioli, Chicken and Spinach Manicotti, Chicken Marsala, Lemon & Herbs Salmon, Tiramisu, and Fresh Fruit Plate, Coffee, and Tea, Tax and, Tip

Cash Bar

Must be received by Friday June 11, 2004. $42.00 per person. Make check payable to WSS.

E-mail Jeri at Jmulrow@nsf.gov or call at 703-292-4784 with questions.

Mail to: Jeri Mulrow, 1061 N. George Mason Dr., Arlington, VA 22205

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Annual Election for Board of Directors

An election ballot for the 2004-2005 program year of the Washington Statistical Society Board of Directors is enclosed in the print issue. Biographical information on the candidates is also provided in this issue. Ballots must be received by Friday, June 4, 2004 to be counted. Results will be announced at the WSS Annual Dinner (pdf) on June 15, 2004.

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Biographical Information Of Candidates For The 2004 - 2005 WSS Board Of Directors

Two Candidates for President-Elect (Vote for 1):

LAWRENCE H. COX is Associate Director for Research and Methodology for the National Center for Health Statistics. Previously, he served as a senior mathematical statistician for the Environmental Protection Agency and the Bureau of the Census and as Director of the Board on Mathematical Sciences of the National Academy of Sciences. Dr. Cox is a Fellow of the American Statistical Association, an Elected Member of the International Statistical Institute and a member of the OMB Federal Committee on Statistical Methodology. He holds a Ph.D. in Mathematics from Brown University and a B.Sc. in Mathematics from Manhattan College. His service to the ASA includes: chair of the Committee on Privacy and Confidentiality; Chair of the Computer Review Group; member of the ASA Board of Directors and chair of the Budget Committee; chair of the Section on Statistical Graphics; and chair of the Section on Statistics and the Environment. Dr. Cox has published and lectured extensively on topics in statistical methodology and environmental statistics. He is best known for his work on statistical disclosure limitation and since 1996 has taught a JPSM course on this topic. Dr. Cox has contributed to ASA scientific programs as chair of the Statistical Graphics Track, 1987 ASA Winter Meeting; organizer, chair, and presenter at numerous invited and topic contributed JSM sessions; organizer of the first two JSM Expositions of Statistical Graphics; JSM luncheon speaker; and, invited speaker, discussant, and panelist at a number of WSS methodology seminars. He recently completed two terms as Chair of the ISI Committee on Statistics and the Environment and is active in efforts to create an ISI Section on Environmental Statistics. In that capacity, Dr. Cox is organizing the Theme Day on Environmental Statistics for the 2005 ISI meetings in Sydney, Australia.

CLYDE TUCKER has been at the Bureau of Labor Statistics for over 20 years and is currently serving as the Senior Survey Methodologist at the Bureau. Previously, Dr. Tucker was Director of the Behavioral Science Research Center in the Office of Survey Methods Research and a Mathematical Statistician in the Office of Prices and Living Conditions. He has led efforts to redesign the Consumer Expenditure Diary to improve reporting and the Point-of-Purchase Survey to increase the timeliness of information needed to update the Consumer Price Index. He led the interagency research effort to redesign the methodology for collecting information on race and ethnicity in all Federal surveys, including Census 2000. He served as a statistical consultant to the bipartisan Congressional Commission assessing the impact of the Family and Medical Leave Act. He is the chair of the committee that oversees the design of the Current Population Survey. Dr. Tucker began his career as the Assistant Manager of CBS News Polls, where he consulted on the design and analysis of exit polls. His research interests include telephone survey design, survey nonresponse, and measurement error. He has a M.S. in statistics and a Ph.D. in political science, both from the University of Georgia, and he is an elected Fellow of the American Statistical Association (ASA). He is a past chair of the Government Statistics Section of ASA, and he has held numerous positions on the board of the American Association for Public Opinion Research.

Two Candidates for Methodology Chair (Vote for 1):

JONAKI BOSE is a statistician in the Office of Survey Programs of the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS). Previously, she was at the National Center for Education Statistics for about eight years and was detailed at the Office of Management and Budget. Her education includes a Master of Science in Survey Methodology (statistical science emphasis) from the Joint Program in Survey Methodology at the University of Maryland. She is the Social Statistics Section program chair for American Statistical Association's 2004 program committee, and is the chair for the Data Collection Section of the Washington Statistical Society. Her interests include disclosure review, nonresponse bias, and longitudinal surveys.

VINCENT G. IANNACCHIONE is a senior research statistician in the Washington office of RTI International. Since receiving an M.S. in Statistics in 1978 from the University of Arkansas, he has spent most of his career working as a sampling statistician. Currently, he directs statistical operations for national surveys on health care, drug abuse, and military studies. His research interests include the use of dual-frame calibration to improve of the efficiency of surveys with a nonresponse follow up and the use of residential mailing lists for in-person household surveys.

One Candidate for Treasurer (Vote for 1):

JOHN FINAMORE is a mathematical statistician in the Demographic Statistical Methods Division of the U.S. Bureau of the Census. He has acted as the lead mathematical statistician on multiple demographic surveys during his seven years at the Bureau. His responsibilities on these surveys have included sampling, estimation, variance estimation, imputation, nonresponse analysis, sample design documentation, and statistical support of operational tasks. In addition, he chaired a workgroup responsible for calculating the sampling information used in the Census 2000-based demographic surveys sample redesign effort. He is also involved in the preliminary planning for the Census Bureau's 2010 demographic surveys sample redesign effort. Mr. Finamore holds a B.S. in Mathematics from James Madison University and an M.S. in Statistics from the University of Connecticut.

Four Candidates for Representative-at-Large (Vote for 2):

JOHNNY BLAIR is a survey methodologist who has conducted research in a number of areas, including sampling for rare populations, measurement error in proxy reporting, data quality in converted refusal interviews and, most recently, the design and the analysis of cognitive interviews for pretesting. His publications include "Assessing Protocols for Child Interviews," "Survey Pretesting: Do Different Methods Produce Different Results?" (with Stanley Presser), the book Designing Surveys: A Guide to Decisions and Procedures (with Ronald Czaja), "Expanding Cognitive Laboratory Methods to Test Self-Administered Questionnaires" (with Susan Schechter), "Aspects of Data Quality in Cognitive Interviews: the case of verbal reports" (with Frederick Conrad), and "Using Network Sampling in a Phone Survey to Locate Non-Telephone Households" (with Nadra Garas). He currently serves on the ASA committee on energy statistics and the Design and Analysis Advisory Committee to the Educational Testing Service (ETS) for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) since 1996.

RICHARD BOLSTEIN is Chair of the Department of Applied & Engineering Statistics at George Mason University. He is also founder and director of their Statistical Consulting Center. He currently serves as secretary of the Southern Regional Council on Statistics. Previously, he served as an associate editor of the Journal of the American Statistical Association, as Representative at Large to WSS (1993-95), as President of the Washington Operations Research & Management Science Council. Dr. Bolstein earned a Ph.D. in mathematics from Purdue University in 1967. His research interests have spanned mathematics, operations research, and statistics and are currently focused on survey sampling, compliance measurement, and categorical data analysis. He is an active consultant to government agencies and private sector firms, including the U.S. Customs Service and the Environmental Protection Agency where he developed sampling designs to measure compliance with U.S. laws.

MICHAEL D. SINCLAIR recently joined the Department of Labor as the Director of Statistical Analysis for the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs. In this position he conducts research into analytical methods to identify discriminatory personnel practices among federal contractors. Dr. Sinclair received his Ph.D. in statistics from George Washington University (GWU) in 1994 and has more than 17 years of experience from both private industry and the Federal Government in designing and conducting statistical studies. Previously, Dr. Sinclair served as a senior statistician at Mathematica Policy Research in Princeton, New Jersey. In this capacity, Dr. Sinclair designed and conducted surveys for the U. S. Department of Agriculture's Food Stamp and Free and Reduced Price Lunch Program, the Centers for Medicare and Medicare Studies' National Medicare Education Program, the Teach-for-American and Ready-to-Learn education programs, and the Community Tracking Study, a household health insurance and physician study conducted the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Prior to MPR, Dr. Sinclair spent six years at the U.S. Census Bureau in Suitland, Maryland designing and conducting studies to evaluate Census programs. His work focused on the assessment of response, measurement, and other nonsampling errors in the Bureau's data collection activities. He has recently published work in Jurimetrics, the Journal of the American Statistical Association, and Survey Methodology and is now completing his term as president of the Princeton-Trenton New Jersey Chapter of the American Statistical Association.

LESLIE WALLACE is a senior statistician at Westat with 17 years of experience in survey research. Since 1989, Ms. Wallace has worked on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), a large ongoing, congressionally mandated survey of the knowledge and skills of students in various subjects, primarily in grades 4, 8, and 12. Other large studies with which she has been involved include the Programme for International Students' Assessment and the National Employer Health Insurance Survey. Her areas of experience include sample design, data weighting, imputation, and variance estimation. She has presented papers at the ASA Joint Statistical Meetings and at the Second International Conference on Establishment Surveys. She served as the SRMS newsletter (co)editor from July 2000 to January 2004. Ms. Wallace holds a Master's degree in statistics from Texas A&M University and a Bachelor's degree in mathematics from the College of William and Mary.

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Spring Research Conference
11th Annual Spring Research Conference on Statistics in Industry and Technology:
Statistics on Data Streams for Scientific Research and mplementation
May 19-21, 2004
National Institute of Standards and Technology
Gaithersburg, Maryland

The Spring Research Conference (SRC) is an annual conference jointly sponsored by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics and the Section on Physical and Engineering Sciences of the American Statistical Association. The SRC provides a continuing forum for promoting statistics in engineering, technology, industry, information and physical sciences. The conference presentations are aimed at statisticians and researchers from corporations, government laboratories, and academic institutions, who use statistics in these disciplines.

Plenary Speakers

  • James Filliben, NIST, "The World Trade Center Collapse: The Critical Role of Statistics"
  • Robert L. Jacobsen, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, "Statistical Issues in Particle Physics Experiments"
  • Vijayan N. Nair, University of Michigan, "Statistical Issues in Network Tomography"
  • Donna F. Stroup, Centers for Disease Control, "Measuring the Burden of Disease and Disability"
  • Edward Wegman, George Mason University, "Visualization in Statistics"

Short Course

Barry I. Graubard, National Cancer Institute, "Analysis of Complex Surveys"
Tuesday, May 18, 2004, 1:00 pm - 5:30 pm
Please note: Registration for the short course does not require Conference registration.

Registration and Additional Information

Registration for the conference is $185 for non-students and $70 for students. The registration fee covers handouts, coffee breaks, lunches on Wednesday and Thursday, and social events. To register, or for more information, please visit http://www-math.cudenver.edu/SRC2004/, email SRC@math.cudenver.edu, or contact one of the Conference Chairs:

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SIGSTAT Topics for Spring 2004

May 5, 2004: Introduction to using Enterprise Guide for Statistical Analysis

This demo begins with a quick tour through the layout and purpose of Enterprise Guide (EG) as a menu-based interface to SAS procedures. Emphasis will be on the statistical capabilities of EG. In particular, a set of data will serve as a case study for performing exploratory data analysis, estimating a multiple regression model, and examining graphical diagnostics for the model fit. The demo will show how code generated by EG can be customized, stored, and rerun, and custom reports saved with the Document Builder.

June 9, 2004: PROC MIXED - Part 6: Generalized Linear Models & Generalized Linear Mixed Models (postponed from April 14, 2004)

Continuing the topic begun in October 2003, the difference between general linear models and models using generalized estimating equations (GEE's) is covered. The available correlation structures in PROC GENMOD are discussed and GENMOD is used to fit a longitudinal data model. Finally, the concepts behind generalized linear mixed models are discussed and a longitudinal data model is fit using the GLIMMIX macro.

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 (Food Safety and Nutrition Room), 1800 M St, NW from 12:30 to 1:30. Enter the South Tower and 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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Note From The WSS NEWS Editor

Items for publication in the Summer 2004 WSS NEWS should be submitted no later than July 9, 2004. 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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