ENVR Awards (Distinguished Achievement Award and Early Investigator Award)

Environmental Statistics is an interdisciplinary endeavor. As such, outstanding contributions may go unrecognized because they are outside the boundaries of traditional fields. The Distinguished Achievement Award and Early Investigator Award from the ASA Section on Statistics and the Environment (ENVR) are intended to recognize these outstanding contributions.

The ENVR initiated awards of Distinguished Achievement Awards and Early Investigator Awards largely to highlight and emphasize the cross-disciplinary focus of statistics and the environment. The awards focus on the recognition of outstanding contributions to the development of methods, issues, concepts, applications, and the initiatives of environmental statistics inclusive of the formulational and foundational effort. Emphasis is placed on categories descriptive of multiple disciplines, activities, and age groups across academic, government, and industrial statisticians and statistical scientists engaged in statistics and the environment. Early Investigator Awards intended to encourage greater participation and study in statistics and the environment are also integral features of this initiative.

​A committee appointed by the Chair of ENVR will make the selection. The Committee considers for awards only those members for whom nominations have been submitted. Committee members do not offer nominations themselves, but encourage you to make a thorough search for good candidates.  Criteria for receiving an award are discussed on the nominations page.

The Distinguished Achievement Awards are antique bronze with the Section's logo die-stamped on one side and ASA's logo on the opposite side. Each award is awarded with a colored ribbon and a certificate of achievement. The Distinguished Achievement Awards and Early Investigator Awards are awarded at a special event at the evening reception following the annual Section Business Meeting at the Joint Statistical Meetings.

The 2025 request for nominations can be found here.

2024

Amy Braverman, Jet Propulsion Laboratory

2023

Dan Cooley, Colorado State University

2022

Mevin Hooten, University of Texas at Austin
Bo Li, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

2021 

No nominations received

2020

No nominations received

2019

No nominations received

2018

Yulia R. Gel, University of Texas at Dallas

2017

Montserrat Fuentes, Virginia Commonwealth University
Alexandra Schmidt, McGill University
Steve Stehman, Syracuse University

2016

Sylvia Esterby, University of British Columbia Okanagan
Robert D. Gibbons, University of Chicago

2015

Sudipto Banerjee, University of California, Los Angeles
Tilmann Gneiting, Heidelberg Institute for Theoretical Studies
Jennifer Hoeting, Colorado State University
Jun Zhu, University of Wisconsin–Madison

2014

Michael Stein, University of Chicago

2013

Alan Gelfand, Duke University
Doug Nychka, National Center for Atmospheric

2012

Stephan Sain, National Center for Atmospheric
Lance Waller, Emory University

2010

Marc G. Genton, Texas A&M University
Victor De Oliveira, University of Texas at San Antonio

2009

William F. Christensen, Brigham Young University

2008

Jay Ver Hoef, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association
Marcia Gumpertz, North Carolina State University
David Marker, Westat

2007

Sarah Nusser, Iowa State University
Dale Zimmerman, University of Iowa
Peter Guttorp, University of Washington

2005

Ronald E. McRoberts

2004

F. Jay Breidt
Mary C. Christman
Eric P. Smith

2003

Dennis Helsel
Gretchen G. Moisen
Jean D. Opsomer
Christopher K. Wikle

2002

Bimal Sinha

2001

Henry Kahn
Nagaraj Neerchal
Mark Berliner

2000

A. John Bailer
Richard L. Smith
James V. Zidek

1999

Donald G. Edwards
George Casella
Carol Gotway Crawford
Paul D. Sampson
Donald L. Stevens, Jr

1998

Robert F. O'Brien

1997

Phillip S. Kott
Timothy G. Gregoire
Barry D. Nussbaum
C.R Rao

1996

Lawrence Cox
Philip Dixon
Abdul El-Shaarawi
Gary Oehlert

1995

Thomas Curran
Lawrence Kupper
Ian MacNeill
Christopher Portier

1994

Naihua Duan
Evan Englund
George Flatman
Joseph Haseman
Richard Hertzberg
Ralph Kodell
Ramon Littell
Barry Margolin
Anthony Olsen
Kenneth Pollock
Douglas Robson
Clifford Spiegelman
N. Scott Urquhart

1993

Richard Anderson
John Bailar
Kenneth Burnham
Loveday Conquest
Noel Cressie
Kenny Crump
John Flueck
David Gaylor
Richard O. Gilbert
Michael Ginevan
William Hunt
J. Stuart Hunter
Walter Liggett
James Matis
Donald Myers
G.P. Patil
Walter Piegorsch
John Rawlings
Charles Rohde
N. Phillip Ross
Louise Ryan
Jerome Sacks
Abraham Silvers
Douglas Splitstone
Paul Switzer
John Warren
Linda Young

2024
Trevor Hefley, Kansas State University
Ander Wilson, Colorado State University

2023
Staci Hepler, Wake Forest University
Rajarshi Guhaniyogi, Texas A&M University

2022
David Bolin, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology
Andrew Zammit-Mangion, University of Wollongong

2021
Abhirup Datta, Johns Hopkins University 
Jonathan Hobbs, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Erin Schliep, University of Missouri

2020
Stefano Castruccio, University of Notre Dame
Joseph Guinness, Cornell University

2019
Emily Kang, University of Cincinnati
Raphaël Huser, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology

2018
Dorit M. Hammerling,  National Center for Atmospheric Research
Matthew Heaton, Brigham Young University
Huiyan Sang, Texas A&M University

2017
 Ephraim Hanks, Penn State University
 Amanda Hering, Baylor University
 Matthias Katzfuss, Texas A&M University
 Elizabeth Mannshardt, US Environmental Protection Agency
 Ying Sun, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology

2016
 William Kleiber, University of Colorado, Boulder
 Benjamin Shaby, Penn State University

2015
Veronica Berrocal, University of Michigan
Mikyoung Jun, Texas A&M University

2014
Murali Haran, Penn State University
Mevin Hooten, Colorado State University
David Warton, University of New South Wales

2013
Kate Calder, Ohio State University
Brian Reich, North Carolina State University

2012
Grace Chiu, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation
Dan Cooley, Colorado State University

2011
Bo Li, Purdue University

2009
Andrew O. Finley, Michigan State University