Nate Silver – Guest Speaker

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“Celebrating Statistics: The Signal and the Noise”

 
 
 
Nate Silver, American statistician and journalist
DATE: Thursday, October 10, 2013
TIME: 4:00pm – 5:00pm
PLACE: James B. Hunt Library, NCSU Centennial Campus
ROOM: Hunt Auditorium
WHO: By Invitation Only
SPONSOR: JMP Division of SAS

The Department of Statistics, together with the JMP Division of SAS, is pleased to announce a guest lecture by Nate Silver, famed statistician, author, blogger and political analyst.

Silver’s lecture is entitled “Celebrating Statistics: The Signal and the Noise.”

Nate is an internationally known journalist, author and political analyst. He accurately predicted the outcome of the 2008 and 2012 presidential races. His book, The Signal and the Noise: Why Most Predictions Fail-But Some Don’t, has reached the New York Times Best Sellers list as #12 for non fiction hardback books after its first week in print. The Signal and the Noise was also named Amazon’s #1 Best Non Fiction Book for 2012.

If you are interested in more information about the event or getting tickets, please email NateSilverEvent@stat.ncsu.edu for more information.

Read more about Nate Silver here

Faculty & Staff Awards

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I am extremely pleased to share with you some very exciting news to celebrate our bright and talented students, superb faculty, and extraordinary staff.

Let me start with Alison McCoy. She is one of inaugural recipients of the “Give a Shout Out to Staff” award, this is a new program from the Staff Senate to celebrate staff members who make NC State a great place to work and deserve praise for going above and beyond the call of duty. Certainly, that is our Alison! The nomination for Alison came from our wonderful students, who very much recognize the great service of our fantastic staff.
 

Sujit Ghosh has been awarded the “2013 Thammasat Honorary Plaque” in recognition of his continuous and outstanding contribution to Thammasat University. This award is given annually to selected alumni, individuals and organizations who have contributed greatly to the esteem and prestige of the University. Then award ceremony event will he held on June 27th, 2013. We will post some pictures in our website!
 

More exciting news: Butch Tsiatis has been awarded an extremely competitive award from the National Institutes of Health NIH (a new R-01), to work on a very exciting initiative while pursuing a new direction in his extremely successful research. His very well received initiative by NIH is to work on the development of Statistical Methods for Complex Data in Cardiovascular Diseases. This grant is another fruitful outcome of the partnership of our Department and Duke, under the great leadership of Butch and Marie.

Please, join us in congratulating Alison, Sujit, and Butch, for these very well deserved recognitions and accomplishments, while expressing our gratitude for all that they do for our great Department!!

Local News Paper Article from Dr. Montserrat Fuentes

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What do sports, hurricanes and elections have in common? They all use the power of statistics to help predict the seemingly unpredictable. From picking the most effective players in baseball to helping coastal residents prepare for storm seasons, statistics make a real difference in our daily lives. And the Triangle area is at the center of this statistical Renaissance.

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2013/04/19/2836879_triangle-the-hotbed-of-the-sexiest.html

NC State Researchers Predict Active Hurricane Season for 2013

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Researchers at North Carolina State University forecast an above-average hurricane season for 2013.

2013 should see 13 to 17 named storms forming in the Atlantic basin, which includes the entire Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, according to Dr. Lian Xie, professor of marine, earth and atmospheric sciences (MEAS), and collaborators Dr. Montserrat Fuentes, professor of statistics, Dr. Dorit Hammerling, postdoctoral research associate in statistics and Bin Liu, research assistant professor in MEAS. This number is higher than the (1950-2012) 62-year average of 10.8 named storms.

Of those named storms, 7 to 10 may grow strong enough to become hurricanes, and three to six may become major hurricanes.

As for the Gulf, this year’s numbers are more in line with historic averages: Xie’s data indicate the likelihood of three to five named storms forming, of which one to two will become hurricanes.

Xie’s methodology evaluates data from the last 100 years on Atlantic Ocean hurricane positions and intensity, as well as other variables including weather patterns and sea-surface temperatures, in order to predict how many storms will form and where they will make landfall.

The Atlantic hurricane season runs from June 1 through Nov. 30. For more details concerning Xie’s methodology, input data and predictions, visit the research group’s website at: http://cfdl.meas.ncsu.edu/research/TCoutlook_2013.html.

Dan Solomon – Paul Minton Service Award 2013

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Very pleased to inform you that Dan Solomon, our Dean and faculty member in our Department, has been selected the winner of the 2013 Paul Minton Service Award to recognize outstanding service to the statistics profession. The award was established to honor Paul Minton, who served the statistics profession nationally and in the southern region for many years and was instrumental in the continued development of statistical education in the region represented by Southern Regional Council on Statistics (SRCoS).

 
The award will be presented at the summer conference, which will take place this year June 2-5 at Montgomery Bell State Park near Nashville, TN. The award ceremony will be part of the Tuesday June 4 banquet.

Dr. Montserrat Fuentes – 2013 Equity for Women Award

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The Faculty Category of the 2013 Equity of Women Award goes to Dr. Montserrat Fuentes, Head of the Department of Statistics for her major contributions to the equity and well-being of women at NC State.

Within her department, Dr. Fuentes recently promoted the establishment of a new Leave Policy for faculty that complements the University’s policies. This family-friendly policy allows for better work-life balance by allowing eligible full-time faculty to adjust course workloads accommodating family-related events such as child birth.

At the university level, Dr. Fuentes worked tirelessly on the Faculty Senate and is personally responsible for the new Parental Leave Policy for Graduate Students. Prior to the policy, a woman who became pregnant as a graduate student would lose her financial support and her health insurance at a time when she needed it most. Also, international students would lose their visa status. Many in the faculty senate were just not aware of the problems that graduate students were facing. Dr. Fuentes did the necessary research, educated the faculty senate, and worked through the Academic Policy Committee and the full Faculty Senate enabling policy change last May. The new policy allows graduate women to maintain their financial support, health insurance, and full-time student status during parental leave.

In addition to these major policy efforts, Dr. Fuentes, a Senior Scholar in the ADVANCE NC STATE program, often speaks to groups about women’s empowerment. For example, she was recently a featured speaker at the Advancing Strategic Partnerships: Women and Minorities in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Conference as well as the North Carolina Symposium for Women in Mathematics and Statistics. Dr. Fuentes has been very supportive and encouraging to female students, faculty and staff. She was instrumental in the establishment of the NC State Women in Statistics Networking Group, which primarily provides support to female graduate students , She is strong advocate for female faculty pursuing administrative positions and leadership roles in professional societies and is very supportive of her staff’s career advancement into leadership positions. These examples of selfless caring for individuals as well as her policy reforms are why Dr. Fuentes is highly deserving of the Faculty Category of 2013 Equity for Women Award.

Dr. Marie Davidian – Not Your Average Statistician

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Statistician Dr. Marie Davidian, in SAS Hall, is working to build public understanding of statistics. It’s no mean feat.

For as long as Marie Davidian can remember, statistics has been a dreaded field. When she tells people she’s a statistician, she doesn’t usually get warm responses. The statistics professor thinks the aversion stems from how poorly the discipline was once taught.

“Traditionally it wasn’t taught as a subject that was really useful,” she says.

But thanks to a major data explosion, statistics is getting a lot of attention in the scientific and popular media. In the past year the Boston Globe, American Journal of Science and Nature have devoted entire editions to data and described the field as “hot.” A watershed event occurred in 2009 when Google chief economist Hal Varian described statisticians as this decade’s “sexy professional.” And dead-on predictions of the 2012 and 2008 presidential elections by statistician Nate Silver were hailed as genius.

“So now we are sexy—it’s great— and this helps raise awareness of how important statistics is,” Davidian says.

NCSU Bulletin Article

Gina Pomann – Outstanding Student Award 2012

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Gina-Maria Pomann, an NSF and AT&T Graduate Research Fellow was awarded the University wide 2012 ‘Outstanding Student Award’ for her efforts to promote diversity and academic excellence on campus. As part of this work, she was awarded a grant by the graduate school to hold events focused on educating students about how to reach their academic goals.

The events will be run by two organizations on campus which she presides over, We Connect Now (WCN)-NCSU and the Society for the Advancement of Chicanos/Hispanics and Native Americans in the Sciences (SACNAS)-NCSU. WCN-NCSU is an organization focused on raising awareness about and promoting the advancement of students with disabilities. SACNAS-NCSU is an organization focused on promoting the advancement of students with diverse backgrounds and particularly focuses on helping students pursue higher levels of education while achieving academic excellence.

For the 2012-2013 academic year, all students are invited to attend five events sponsored by the Graduate School: (1) a seminar about skills and tactics for taking the GRE; (2) a seminar given by Dr. David Shafer of the Graduate School about different types of funding for graduate study; (3) an event called ‘Speed Networking’ with an emphasis on teaching students the skills and the power of networking; (4) a graduate student panel about funding sources for graduate study; and (5) a mentoring lunch mixer with faculty.

Information about these organizations, their initiatives, and events can be found on their websites and Facebook pages. Volunteers are always needed to help plan and implement these events. Please feel free to contact either of the organizations if you would like to get involved!

SACNAS-NCSU
Website: http://ncsu.orgsync.com/org/sacnas
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SACNAS.NCSU
Email: sacnas.ncsu@gmail.com

WCN-NCSU
Website: http://ncsu.orgsync.com/org/weconnectnowncstate/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WCN.NCSU
Email: weconnectnow.ncsu@gmail.com