ASA at 175 - Supporting The World of Statistics

By Ronald Wasserstein posted 01-21-2014 10:40

  

As part of its strategic efforts to increase the visibility of the statistics profession, the ASA was a strong supporter of the International Year of Statistics, and now supports its successor, The World of Statistics.  Today, January 21, 2014, we officially launch The World of Statistics Website.  Below are portions of the “welcome blog” I wrote for that website.  (View the full welcome blog here.)

Greetings and welcome to The World of Statistics, the successor to the highly successful and world-popular International Year of Statistics (Statistics2013) campaign.

Today’s public debut of this website and the simultaneous publication of the newsletter mark the official launch of The World of Statistics.

Thousands of statistical organizations around the world are excited to continue working with The World of Statistics campaign toward the goals that initially were established for Statistics2013. As a refresher, those objectives are:

  • Increasing public awareness of the power and impact of statistics on all aspects of society
  • Nurturing statistics as a profession, especially among young people
  • Promoting creativity and development in the sciences of probability and statistics

You may be asking yourself why The World of Statistics was created. As the International Year of Statistics neared its conclusion, its Steering Committee unanimously agreed that the statistical profession would benefit from an ongoing campaign to address the above goals.

Since the announcement of The World of Statistics’ creation, response from participating groups resoundingly has been supportive, with many eager to build on the work that was started by the Statistics2013 campaign.

Unlike its predecessor, we mark the launch of The World of Statistics with worldwide reach of more than 2,300 participating organizations—all the groups that had signed up for and participated in the International Year of Statistics and a handful that have joined since the end of 2013.

We invite and strongly encourage you and your organization to continue participating in the Statistics2013 movement through The World of Statistics campaign. Together, we’ll make more progress toward educating the public worldwide about the contributions of statistics and statisticians to our global society and introducing young people to careers in our venerable profession.

Much was accomplished in 2013 under the International Year of Statistics banner. But much remains to be done to raise the public profile of statistical science around the world.

By working together through The World of Statistics, we can make further inroads to educating the public and the media about the power of statistics and the career opportunities that await young people.

Here’s to a successful 2014 and thank you for supporting The World of Statistics!

In 2014, the American Statistical Association is celebrating its 175th anniversary.  Over the course of this year, this blog will highlight aspects of that celebration, and look broadly at the ASA and its activities.  Please contact ASA Executive Director Ron Wasserstein (ron@amstat.org) if you would like to post an entry to this blog
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