Dear ASA Members:
Four years from today, at the University of Colorado Boulder Campus Events Center on October 20, 2020, which will be the 3rd UN World Statistics Day, the LISA 2020 Program will celebrate the successful accomplishment of its goal to create a network of 20 statistical collaboration laboratories (“stat labs”) in developing countries to train the next generation of statisticians and data scientists to become effective interdisciplinary collaborators and enable and accelerate research and data-based decision making. On that day four years from now, all 20 of the directors of the new stat labs enter the stage one-by-one. a video on the screens behind them will display the name of their statistical collaboration laboratory and their impacts (year of creation, number of statisticians trained, number of clients served, number of papers co-authored). A short video clip will highlight one of their impacts, perhaps an interview with a client explaining what the stat lab enabled her to achieve with her research, how a new government policy is improving the lives of its citizens, or an interview with a business owner describing how many new jobs were created because of collaboration with the statistics laboratory. As each director is introduced, a digital counter will tally the number of stat labs in developing countries created. Anticipation will build as the number approaches 20. When the 20th director is introduced, balloons and confetti will be released in a celebratory climax.
And here’s where you may come in… Also joining the 20 directors on stage will be everyone else who made that dream a reality: the LISA Ambassadors and Mentors who will visit the newly created stat labs to help them grow and become sustainable, the members of the LISA 2020 mentoring network of statistical experts who provide guidance on a few projects each year, the LISA 2020 Advisory Council, the Program Manager, the Assessment Coordinator, and the funders of the LISA 2020 Program.
Stay tuned for opportunities to contribute to the LISA 2020 Program. We need:
- LISA Fellows—statisticians and data scientists from developing countries who want to be trained to become more effective collaborative statisticians, will “intern” in stat labs in the US to gain more experience, and will return to their home countries to create statistical collaboration laboratories in their universities or institutions
- LISA Ambassadors—typically Statistics PhD students who are trained collaborative statisticians and have experience working in university stat lab and will work in a newly created LISA 2020 stat lab for ~6 months to help it grow and become sustainable
- LISA Mentors—experienced statisticians or data scientists who have worked with the LISA Fellows during their “internships” and will engage with the newly created stat labs via short-term visits and long-term follow-up
- LISA 2020 mentoring network of experts—statisticians and data scientists from around the world who have specific expertise they are willing to share when the projects of the LISA 2020 stat labs require it. If a project in my stat lab (LISA at CU Boulder) calls for spatial statistics, I might not be an expert in that area, but my colleague down the hall, Will Kleiber, is and I can call upon his expertise. The LISA 2020 stat labs will not have expertise in every relevant area of statistics and, from time to time, may call upon this mentoring network of experts.
- A Program Manager and an Assessment Coordinator to help with this program
- Funding, so if anyone personally knows a specific person at an agency, company, or foundation who may be willing to fund this exciting program to build statistics capacity and research infrastructure in developing countries, please let me know and please arrange a “warm introduction.”
------------------------------
Eric Vance
Associate Professor and Director of LISA (Laboratory for Interdisciplinary Statistical Analysis)
University of Colorado Boulder
Boulder CO, United States
------------------------------