Boston Chapter won the ASA Giving Day Chapter Challenge
On Nov 20 2023, ASA Executive Director Ron Wasserstein announced that the Boston Chapter won the ASA Giving Day Chapter Challenge for Region 1. Find these results on the ASA Contest page of the Giving Day site.
Thank you for the generous support you showed on the 2023 ASA Giving Day and for indicating the Boston Chapter as your home chapter on the donation page. This philanthropic support will help ASA Programs that promote the practice and profession of statistics.
Thank you for being an invaluable member of our community. We look forward to your continued engagement in our chapter by attending chapter events or volunteering in chapter activities.
2023 Spring Election Results
The Boston Chapter has elected the following officers for two-year terms starting on
January 1, 2024:
Vice President-elect 2024-2025: Shannon Stock, College of the Holy Cross
Treasurer-elect 2024-2025: Tom Lane, MathWorks
Secretary-elect 2024-2025: Kush Kapur, Argenx
2022 Spring Election Results
- President-elect 2023-2025: Wenting Cheng, Biogen
- Secretary-elect 2023-2024: Kush Kapur, Argenx
- Program Chair-elect 2023-2025: Jianjun Hua, Dartmouth College
- Webmaster-elect 2023-2025: Piaomu Liu, Bentley University
- Newsletter Editor-elect 2023-2025: Jiaying Weng, Bentley University
2022 Statistical Outreach and Literacy Award
Prof. Elena Naumova of Tufts University is the recipient of 2022 Statistical Outreach and Literacy Award. She is the Chair of the Division of Nutrition Data Science, as well as a Professor at the Friedman School. Prof. Naumova will deliver a presentation this fall, and registration details about her presentation are upcoming.
The Boston Chapter of the ASA YouTube Channel
The Chapter has launched its YouTube channel here. Click, subscribe, like and share with your stats pals!
2021 Spring Election Results
The Boston Chapter has elected four new chapter officers for two-year terms starting on January 1, 2022. The new officers are:
Vice President: Shannon Stock, Associate Professor at College of the Holy Cross; PhD in Biostatistics, Harvard University.
Secretary: Wenting Cheng, Principal Biostatistician at Biogen, Cambridge, MA; PhD in Biostatistics, University of Michigan.
Treasurer: Lisa Mukherjee, Consultant.
Council of Chapters Representative: Jianchang Lin, Director, Statistical and Quantitative Sciences at Takeda; PhD in Statistics, Florida State University.
Four New Chapter Officers Elected for Terms Starting January 1, 2021
The Boston Chapter has elected four new chapter officers for two-year terms starting on January 1, 2021. The new officers are:
- President: Olga Vitek, Professor, Director - MS in Data Science Program, Khoury College of Computer Sciences, Northeastern University; Ph.D., Statistics, Purdue University, 2005
- Program Chair: Kristin Baltrusaitis, Research Associate, Center for Biostatistics in AIDS Research, Harvard T.H Chan School of Public Health; Ph.D., Biostatistics, Boston University, 2019
- Webmaster: Piaomu Liu, Assistant Professor, Mathematical Sciences, Bentley University; Ph.D., University of South Carolina, 2016
- Newsletter Editor: Elizabeth Kane, Senior Manager, Biostatistics, Boston Biomedical Associates, Marlborough, MA; Ph.D., Biostatistics, Boston University, 2016
Congratulations! And many thanks to all of them for volunteering to serve!
Report on the Spring 2017 Chapter Membership Survey
In May/June 2017, the Boston Chapter asked the over 1,100 ASA members who live in the five states covered by our chapter, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Rhode Island, to complete an online survey. The goal was to learn more about our membership, their needs and priorities, and how well the Chapter is fulfilling these. Another important goal was to determine why some ASA members in our area have yet to join the Chapter. We received responses from 308 ASA members, for a response rate of 26.5%.
Here are a few statistics from the survey data: 78% of respondents were from Massachusetts, 5-6% each from Maine, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island. All ages were represented: 5% were 18-25 years old, 22% were 26-35 years, 21% were 36-45 years, 19% were 45-55 years, and 33% over 55. The majority of respondents had a doctorate (57%), but also master’s degrees (34%), and Bachelor’s or other certifications (8%). Please click here to find our report on the survey results. Should you have additional thoughts or suggestions, please do not hesitate to contact our Membership Committee chaired by Miriam Chernoff (mchernoff@sdac.harvard.edu).
Video from the April 27 Chernoff Symposium
On April 27 2018, former students, colleagues, and friends of Herman Chernoff converged on Radcliff’s Hilles Hall in Cambridge for a one-day symposium celebrating the 95th birthday of Professor Herman Chernoff. The Chapter was pleased to co-sponsor this event. A video of the presentations was prepared by the Harvard Statistics Department and is now available on our website at http://community.amstat.org/bostonchapter/recent-events/new-item2. The video is provided in five parts as follows:
Part I:
- William DuMouchel (Oracle Health Sciences): Some applications of Bayesian models for meta-regression and drug safety data.
- Shaw-Hwa Lo (Columbia University): Selecting influential/predictive variables for a large data set.
- Joseph Kadane (Carnegie Mellon University): Herman Chernoff on the sin of ignoring data.
Part II:
- Stuart Geman (Brown University): Populations, individuals, and what the doctor tells he patient.
- Jacob Abernathy (Georgia Institute of Technology): Understanding generalization in machine learning through Chernoff bounds.
Part III:
- Nancy Reid (University of Toronto): Statistical visualization comes of age.
Part IV:
- David Siegmund (Stanford University): Detection and estimation of local signals.
- Lucas Janson (Harvard University): Model X knockoffs: Exact inference with any variable importance measure.
- Panel discussion led by Miriam Chernoff (Harvard School of Public Health). The panelists are Carl Morris (Harvard University); Joseph Gastwirth (George Washington University); Roy Welsch (MIT); and Mark Vangel (Massachusetts General Hospital).
Part V:
- After dinner speakers: Henry Brown (Boston College), David Siegmund (Stanford University), and Oliver Weisberg (Alibaba)
The Chapter thanks the Harvard Statistics Department for preparing and making these videos available to us. We also thank the speakers and other participants who contributed to making the event a great success.