ASA Sections and Interest Groups

1. ASA Sections and Interest Groups

2. Sections and Interest Groups are communities interested in a particular statistical theory, methodology, or application that is sufficiently broad to represent active professional interests

3. Section and Interest Group Member Benefits • Networking with members who have similar interests • Online discussions in dedicated ASA Community groups • In-person meetings at conference mixers • Mentoring programs • Keeping up-to-date in your area • Scientific program at the Joint Statistical Meetings (JSM) • Continuing education classes or webinars • Information on special interest conferences • Other benefits • Section newsletters • Best paper and poster awards at JSM • Leadership opportunities • Sponsored awards • Student competitions

4. Differences between Sections and Interest Groups • Sections • There are 28 Sections as of October 2016 • Member fees (ranging from $5 to $12 per year) • Formal charter with elected chairs and other officers • Interest Groups • There are 6 Interest Groups as of October 2016 • No member fees • Can include non-ASA members

5. *Membership total in October 2018

7. Section on Bayesian Statistical Science • Networking opportunities, including emails about job openings and conferences • Provides generous support for student travel including the International Society for Bayesian Analysis meetings and co-sponsors the Mitchell Prize and the Savage Award • Offers terrific short courses at conferences

8. Biometrics Section • Provides opportunities to network with fellow statisticians, data scientists and quantitative analysts in areas of biological and biomedical research • Sponsors the annual David P. Byar Young Investigator Award, JSM student travel awards, and a variety of funding mechanisms for training, such as post-doctoral career-development awards • Offers grant opportunities to its membership for strategic initiatives

9. Biopharmaceutical Section • Provides continuing education through mentoring, podcasts, the Biopharm Report and sponsors the annual Regulatory-Industry Statistics Workshop • Supports a community of academic, industry and regulatory statisticians committed to the application of statistics to the development and use of therapeutic drugs, biologics and devices in humans and animals

10. Section on Statistical Computing • Sponsors the John M. Chambers Statistical Software Award and the Statistical Computing and Graphics Award • Organizes a special poster session, The Data Expo, where all of the papers presented are reports of analyses of a common dataset • Co-sponsors other meetings that are relevant to statistical computing such as the Interface Conference and the Women in Statistics and Data Science Conference

11. Section on Statistical Consulting • Provides networking opportunities for statistical consultants in all areas including industry, finance, and government, including both large and individual practices • Supports training and education of effective statistical consultants and collaborators, including professional development and sharing of best practices • Works to understand and disseminate best practices at academic statistical consulting and collaboration centers

12. Section on Statistics and Data Science Education • Offers opportunities for all statistics and data science educators to share and discuss ideas through professional meetings, online discussion groups, and personal connections made through the section • Provides education resources such as professional development, research findings, funding opportunities and sponsors the Waller Education Awards, the Ron Wasserstein and Speed Session Awards for presentations at JSM, and the Section Mentoring Program • Creates and shapes policies of the ASA and professional communities regarding educational innovations

13. Section on Statistics in Defense and National Security • Promotes the statistics profession and statistical best practices within the national defense and security sectors • Provides networking and training opportunities • Sponsors Defense and Aerospace Test and Analysis Workshop (DATAWorks), focused on strengthening the community around statistical approaches to test, evaluation, and modeling and simulation for defense and aerospace

14. Section on Statistics and the Environment • Promotes the use and advancement of sound statistical practices in environmental science through collaboration, guidance, and research, and facilitates the interaction between environmental statisticians in academia, federal agencies, private companies, and non-profits • Organizes and holds the biennial ENVR/EnviBays Workshop, co-sponsors conferences and workshops, awards Young Investigator Awards and Distinguished Achievement Medals, and supports the professional advancement of students and early career researchers • Promotes identification, study, and resolution of statistical problems leading to cogent policies addressing public health, ecological, economic, and other consequences of environmental contamination and alteration

15. Section on Statistics in Epidemiology • Offers opportunities to network with fellow statisticians who conduct epidemiologic research • Sponsors the Nathan Mantel Award for Lifetime Contributions to Statistics in Epidemiology and Young Investigator Awards, co-sponsors conferences such as the Epidemiology Congress of the Americas, and provides a mentoring program for junior investigators   • Promotes sound statistical practice in epidemiology, develops statistical methods appropriate to epidemiologic research, and advances substantive issues in public health

16. Government Statistics Section • Offers ongoing dialogues with statisticians involved in the development of techniques and practices related to government statistics and products, advancing knowledge sharing of cutting-edge practices • Provides opportunities for members to better understand the levels of quality, continuity, comparability, appropriateness, accessibility, relevance, and timeliness of governmental statistical activities and the role of professional statisticians in public programs • Co-sponsors the Jeanne E. Griffith Mentoring Award, the Wray Jackson Smith Scholarship, the Roger Herriot Award, and the Data Challenge. Sponsors the Pat Doyle Award. Organizes topical workshops

17. Section on Statistical Graphics • Offers opportunities to network with statisticians interested in computing and graphics from a diverse collection of institutions and companies • Co-sponsors annual “Data Expo” competition with Computing and Government sections • Co-sponsors prestigious Statistical Computing and Graphics Award (awarded every 2-6 years). This award carries with it a cash prize of $5,000 plus an allowance of up to $1,000 for travel to the annual Joint Statistical Meetings

18. Health Policy Statistics Section • Opportunities to get involved with a super friendly and open group of researchers who represent interdisciplinary fields that involve decision sciences, economics, ethics, management, and political analysis, as well as evaluative science and statistics • Sponsors the biennial International Conference on Health Policy Statistics • Develops and applies state-of-the-art statistical methods to design studies, analyze data, and interpret results to inform health policy change; track the nation’s health; and measure the effectiveness of interventions on a large scale

19. Section on Statistics in Imaging • Provides networking opportunities for statisticians working in imaging science • Sponsors student paper competitions • Sponsors sessions at JSM and other conferences highlighting modern problems in statistical imaging science and in associated areas of application

20. Section on Statistical Learning and Data Science • Serves as the Association's focal point for Data Science and Statistical Learning issues • Creates forums for presentation and discussion of research in these fields • Builds cooperative relationships on behalf of the Association with other organizations that have interests in these fields

21. Lifetime Data Science Section • Focuses on analysis of time-to-event data with censoring, truncation and competing risks • Interested in counting processes, multi-state, multiple or clustered events, and longitudinal biomarker histories, and quality-of-life models • Recognizes interdisciplinary research in areas such as finance, economics, imaging, engineering, genomics and genetics

22. Section on Statistics in Marketing • Provides networking opportunities to discuss development and application of statistical methods in the marketing area • Provides opportunities to see state-of-the-art work involving statistics and marketing issues • Sponsors a Travel Award for PhD students to travel to JSM and present their research

23. Section on Medical Devices and Diagnostics • A strong community for statisticians collaborating in medical devices and diagnostics • Offers best and contributed paper awards at JSM and a mentoring program • Provides mechanisms to disseminate statistical innovations and best practices for clinical studies of medical devices and diagnostics

24. Mental Health Statistics Section • Provides a forum for individuals working across the broad field of statistical methods for mental health research, including psychology, psychiatry, neuroscience, medicine, and public health • Co-sponsors the Thomas R. TenHave Symposium on Statistics in Mental Health • Facilitates methodological research in areas including longitudinal data analysis, measurement, latent variables, causal inference and missing data

25. Section on Nonparametric Statistics • Provides a stimulating environment to get engaged in modern nonparametric statistics in an integrated fashion • Co-sponsors conferences and workshops such as the International Society for Non-Parametric Statistics Conference and the Workshop on Nonparametric Statistics for Big Data • Sits at the nexus of theory and applications, in particular in the big data era; members represent research areas such as omics, neuroimaging, modern medicine, ranking/selection, machine learning, nonparametric Bayes, semiparametric/nonparametric survival analysis, data exploration/visualization or smoothing, function estimation, functional and longitudinal data

26. Section on Physical & Engineering Sciences • Provide opportunities to develop professional relationships among colleagues with interests in statistics for the physical and engineering sciences • Fosters the exchange of information among statisticians concerning statistical issues arising in the physical and engineering sciences • Sponsors events such as the Fall Technical Conference and the Spring Research Conference and associated Short Courses to promote ongoing professional development

27. Section for Statistical Programmers and Analysts • Provides networking opportunities to support each other regardless of business, stage of career, or geographic location • Provides a venue for statistical programmers to discuss interests, share experiences, knowledge and challenges, and to increase the awareness of their roles in the entire statistical and analytics community • Provides a conference grant for students and recent graduates

28. Section on Quality and Productivity • Offers opportunities to network with fellow statisticians interested in the development, teaching and application of statistical tools and statistical thinking for improving quality and productivity • Provides 2 Mary G. and Joseph Natrella scholarships annually to help students further their graduate education, sponsors and provides student scholarships to attend the Quality and Productivity Research Conference and sponsors the Gerald J. Hahn Q&P Achievement Award • Provides opportunities for leadership and professional growth through volunteer and elected positions

29. Social Statistics Section • Provides networking opportunities for statisticians in the social sciences • Co-sponsors the Jeanne E. Griffin Mentoring Award, the Wray Jackson Smith Scholarship, Roger Herriot Award, and Student Paper Awards • Sponsors workshops on cutting edge issues in the social sciences, such as the Adaptive Design Workshop

30. Statistics in Sports Section • Promotes content in sports statistics as a main sponsor of paper and poster sessions at the Joint Statistical Meetings and co-sponsor of events such as the Cascadia Symposium on Statistics in Sports, the Carnegie Mellon Sports Analytics Conference, and the New England Symposium on Statistics in Sport (NESSIS) • Promotes publications that have content in sports statistics, especially the ASA-sponsored Journal of Quantitative Analysis in Sports • Increases the availability of information related to statistics in sports through the section’s website, and through the activities of the section’s officers and members in print and social media

31. Survey Research Methods Section • Offers opportunities to network with fellow statisticians in the field of survey research • Recognizes outstanding graduate student research through the Edward C. Bryant Scholarship, offers best poster awards at JSM and publishes free-of-charge on-line series for non-specialists “What is a Survey?” • Promotes opportunities to learn more about novel, cutting-edge research in survey methodology through section activities, including a proceedings page, and the Journal of Survey Statistics and Methodology, an Oxford journal sponsored by ASA and AAPOR

32. Section on Teaching of Statistics in the Health Sciences • Provides support and mentorship to new teachers of statistics in the health sciences, especially those who are junior, isolated, or in need of resources • Promotes sharing of teaching materials through the TSHS Resources Portal, sponsors the Outstanding Teaching Award, the Young Investigator Award and the Distinguished Achievement Award • Offers access to leaders, researchers and innovators in the dissemination of modern resources, methods and best practices for the teaching of statistics in the health sciences

33. Transportation Statistics Interest Group • Provides opportunities to network with fellow statisticians in fields of transportation statistics • Offers low cost/free webinars and short courses, co-sponsors conferences, and organizes in-person meetings at both JSM and the Transportation Board Annual Meeting • Promotes connections with the Transportation Research Board of National Academies, Institute of Transportation Engineers, American Statistical Association, and a broad range of government and industry institutes

34. Statistics in Business Analytics/Statistics Education Interest Group • Develop the business statistics/analytics curriculum for the 21st century                        • Improve business statistics/analytics education to meet modern challenges                  • Improve the quality of instruction in teaching business statistics/analytics

35. Uncertainty Quantification in Complex Systems Interest Group • Promotes the ASA-SIAM Journal on Uncertainty Quantification • Co-organizes multidisciplinary conferences, such as the SIAM Conference on Uncertainty Quantification • Provides sessions at interdisciplinary conferences

36. Astrostatistics Interest Group • Expose statisticians to astronomy as a fruitful area of collaborative methodological development and educate them as to the abundant, diverse, and challenging quantitative problems faced by astronomers • Advertise and promote conferences, workshops, summer schools, and events at the intersection of astronomy, astro-particle physics, astrophysics, computer science, cosmology, solar physics, and statistics • Establish and maintain connections with related working groups in astronomy in the U.S. and internationally, such as with the International Astrostatistics Association (IAA), and including an affiliation with the Astrostatistics and Astroinformatics Portal (ASAIP)

37. Statistics and Pharmacometrics Interest Group • Provides a venue for encouraging collaboration between pharmacometricians and statisticians • Offers opportunities to discuss and develop pharmacometrics methodology and share code • Promotes innovative approaches to model informed drug development

38. History of Statistics Interest Group • Share resources for teaching the history of statistics so students learn about the impact statisticians have made throughout history • Hold annual mixer and provide a booth/table with materials at the Joint Statistical Meetings • Forge relationships and share resources with history groups in other statistics and mathematics societies