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Message
From the President
By Debra Stiver, President
Annual Meeting Coming Soon – Join Us!
This year’s NV-ASA annual meeting will take place in Reno on
Saturday, October 22. At this meeting, we will introduce the newly
elected officers for year 2006, cover budget matters, highlight
the accomplishments of the past year, and look at future needs and
programs related to our chapter growth and membership. We
invite you to participate in the annual meeting which will be held
at the Little Waldorf Restaurant on North Virginia Street, across
from the University of Nevada, Reno. The meeting will include
a luncheon and begin at approximately 12:30 p.m. Look for flyers
announcing a definite start time and cost for the lunch. Given
our nominee slate, we will be seeing some new faces on the 2006
NV-ASA board. New member participation is crucial to keeping
our chapter active and growing. Please mark your calendars and join
us for this meeting to see what NV-ASA is all about!
Mentor Program Kick-Off: Have You Ever Considered Being a
Mentor?
Earlier this year, NV-ASA was awarded a $5,000 Strategic Initiatives
Grant from national ASA to develop a mentorship program in Nevada.
Prior to the annual meeting on October 22, NV-ASA will be
conducting a mentoring program development workshop. The workshop
will be held on the University of Nevada campus and will start at
approximately 9:30 a.m. During the workshop, various existing
mentor programs and resources will be presented and evaluated. The
ultimate goal of the workshop is to select the unique path we want
to take for our Nevada mentoring program. Additionally, participants
will develop materials, guidelines and strategies for implementing
the program. Once these materials are developed, NV-ASA plans
to conduct mentor training workshops in both northern and southern
Nevada. Several members from around the state have already signed
up to participate. If you are interested in becoming a mentor,
we hope you will join us at this workshop. There is no cost
to participate. For a description and further information
on the program, see the article in this newsletter by Chad Cross.
Location and exact starting time will be emailed to members.
Some Notes From The JSM Meetings Held This Summer In Minneapolis……
Your Chapter Representative, Hokwon Cho and I attended the Joint
Statistical Meetings (JSM) this summer in Minneapolis. Every
year, chapter officers are invited to a variety of functions including
the Council of Chapter (COC) Annual Business Meeting and the COC
Workshop and Reception. These annual gatherings provide a
forum for chapter officers to learn about activities being conducted
by other chapters, resources available from national ASA to help
individual chapters meet their goals, and new ASA programs and grants
that may have been developed during the previous year. I was
pleased to learn that the Nevada Chapter accomplishes a great deal
by national standards, especially given our small membership. For
a chapter to be in good standing with national ASA, they must accomplish
the following: elect officers according the chapter’s
constitution; hold at least one chapter meeting per calendar year;
and, report certain information to the national office including
an annual report of chapter activities and finances. Our officers
have done a great job in meeting these requirements. Additionally,
NV-ASA conducts several workshops throughout the year such as the
northern and southern Career Day events and other speaker forums.
For our size – the efforts exceed national expectations!!
Any member wishing information on resources should contact
one of the NV-ASA Board – much is available to members
for the enhancement of education and professional development.
HOPE TO SEE YOU ON OCTOBER 22!!!
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Election
Time
By Sandra Catlin, Past-President
and Chair, Nominating Committee
The Nominating Committee is very pleased to announce the candidates
for the offices of President, Northern Vice-President, and Secretary.
We express our appreciation for these individuals’
willingness to serve. Brief biographies of each of the candidates
follow below. All current NV-ASA members will receive electronic
ballots that must be returned by Tuesday, October 18, 2005.
Nominee for the Office of President:
Charles Davis has been active in statistics for over thirty years
as a teacher, researcher, and consultant. He helped to form
the Northwest Ohio Chapter of the ASA in the late 1970s, and served
the Chapter in various capacities while on the faculty of the Department
of Mathematics of the University of Toledo. Since 1985 he
has focused on research and consulting in environmental statistics,
with special emphasis on characterization and monitoring in regulatory
settings. He is currently Principal Statistician at EnviroStat,
whose clients include the U.S. Department of Energy and its contractors,
along with a range of environmental and engineering firms across
the country.
Nominee for the Office of Northern Vice-President:
Toni Sipic is currently an economics graduate student at the University
of Nevada, Reno. Besides taking classes and writing his thesis,
he works as a graduate assistant. Currently Toni is teaching
the Principles of Statistics in the College of Business. This
is his second semester of teaching this class, and he has also taught
the Principles of Microeconomics and Macroeconomics. He has just
recently become a member of the ASA, and is looking forward to contributing
to the organization.
Nominee for the Office of Secretary:
Alejandra Livingston has been working for the state of Nevada for
9 1ž2 years. For the past year, she has been working for the
State of Nevada Department of Corrections as an Economist III, where
she is responsible for managing the Statistics & Planning Section
which produces much of the data for the department, including on-going
statistical reports used to assist in operational and planning decisions,
analysis of legislation, projections, and development of master
capacity plans. Alejandra also worked as a Grant and Projects Analyst
for eight years for the University’s Office of Sponsored Projects
and for the Nevada Division for Aging Services. In both these
organizations, Alejandra had responsibilities in federal reporting
requirements. She was the lead person in the management of
the National Aging Information System which was a federally mandated
program meant to track statistical information on the aging population
for every state. Alejandra earned her first hands-on experience
in statistics while earning Bachelor’s and a Master’s
Degree in Economics at UNR. During this period, Alejandra
was a Teaching Assistant in statistics and econometrics, and worked
as a Research Assistant for the Center for Economic Development
and for the City of Reno Redevelopment Agency. Alejandra is
married with two children, ages 4 1ž2 and 7, and also has a many
hobbies.
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NV-ASA
Mentoring Workshop
By C. L. Cross, Education
Committee
The NV-ASA will be hosting a mentoring workshop on October 22, 2005
at UNR. The workshop is part of a larger effort by the officers
and members of the NVASA to participate more fully in the statistics
community in Nevada. Last spring we submitted a proposal to
the ASA national office requesting funds to begin a mentoring program.
We were delighted to have received $5000 towards our efforts.
The goal of the mentoring program is to more actively involve professional
statisticians in the statistics community by introducing them to
statistics students and high school statistics teachers. We
hope that these professionals will serve as mentors to provide support,
research/teaching ideas, and other statistical expertise to those
students and teachers interested in becoming more involved in their
chosen fields.
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SAVE
THE DATE!
Fall Statistics Symposium in Las Vegas
Saturday, November 19, 2005
The half-day symposium and luncheon will take us on a tour of current
applications of traditional and non-traditional statistics from
a variety of fields. It is also an opportunity for the statistical
community to network for future resources, to discuss our professional
needs and solutions, and to brainstorm about options for strengthening
the use of statistics in the Las Vegas community and the state.
Watch the NV-ASA web site and your email
for more information. If you would like to help with the symposium
as a volunteer or speaker, please contact Carol Thompson at cthompson@anteon.com
or at (702) 731-5550 x207.
Be there!!!
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JSM
2005 in Minneapolis
By Hokwon Cho, NV-ASA Chapter
Representative
Traveling to participate in the annual Joint Statistical Meeting
(JSM) is always very exciting for me, not only because the meeting
is one of the biggest statistical conferences, but also because
it provides tremendous opportunities for all attendees – faculty,
students, researchers, and public and private sector statisticians.
This year, the meeting was held Aug. 7-11 in Minneapolis, Minnesota
by ASA, IMS (Institute of Mathematical Statistics), IBS (International
Biometrics Society) and SSC (Statistical Society of Canada), the
main international organizations for statistical sciences in North
America.
I attended JSM for two major reasons: to give a presentation in
a contributed session and to attend the Chapters’ meetings
as NV-ASA’s chapter representative. I left McCarran International
Airport on August 6, accompanied by Frank, an MS Statistics graduate
student and an NV-ASA member. After four hours, we arrived
in Minneapolis, a city less humid than I expected (although it did
rain a couple of times during our stay). Since our hotel was
about 11 blocks from the Convention Center where JSM was held, I
walked everyday along the Nicollet Mall Street and the city park,
which are known as the sight-seeing centers in Minneapolis.
In the ASA presidential address, Dr. Fritz Scheuren, who visited
Las Vegas for our chapter’s 2004 annual meeting, talked about
JSM’s main theme: “Using Our Discipline to Enhance Human
Welfare.” JSM 2005 included seven keynote addresses,
several plenary sessions, approximately 530 presentations, exhibits,
continuing education, and many attractive events with lots of fun
and fun and fun!!! A new addition to this year’s conference
was the daily issue of JSM Highlights, which included highlights
of the day’s activities and many other interesting and useful
pieces of information for all attendees.
Our Chapter President, Debra Stiver, and I were invited to two ASA
chapter-related meetings, the Council of Chapters (COC) sponsored
meeting and the COC Workshop. These meetings provided useful opportunities
for local chapter officers to communicate in a forum, and to exchange
ideas about chapter activities and interests. Unfortunately, my
attendance at the first COC meeting was cut short because it partially
overlapped with the time of my presentation. The next day I attended
the Council of Chapters Workshop and Reception. The topic of the
annual business meeting, given by the COC chair, Ms. Janet Buckingham,
was “ASA Task Force on Welcoming New Members.” She provided
valuable information for recruiting new members, such as how to
write a welcoming letter, how to identify ASA members who are not
members of a local chapter, and what information is available on
ASA’s COC website. Mr. Nicholas Horton, the Chair of the Boston
Chapter of ASA, gave an introduction to Mu Sigma Rho, the National
Honor Society for Statistics. In February 2005, the National Mu
Sigma Rho organization approved a proposal that allows ASA Chapters
to become affiliate chapters of Mu Sigma Rho (website: http://www.stat.sc.edu/msrnatl.html).
Their future plans are to expand membership to more colleges and
universities, and to maintain a list of liaisons at the local level.
On Wednesday, the 10th, I had a chance to visit the Mississippi
River with one of my former classmates from Washington D.C. We walked
across the stone bridge and observed the river for an hour. The
river looked very steep since we were on the upper stream, and I
found three docks in operation for boats and barge ships. Even though
I saw only a limited part of the city, it would be very nice to
visit Minneapolis another time. In the evening, leaving the remaining
events and enjoyable sights behind I had to be headed for Las Vegas
– my home. Goodbye to JSM 2005 and Minneapolis. Thank you!
The next JSM 2006 will be held in Seattle, Washington. For the entire
program of JSM, you can visit the ASA website at http://www.amstat.org.
Then, click Meetings & Events. Hope to see you all in Seattle
in the next year!
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SPECIAL
OFFER for NV-ASA Members
SPSS is holding its Directions User Conference at
Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, November 16-19, 2005. NV-ASA
members can register for the conference at the lowest rate of $299
up to the day of the event “only” by contacting Jeff Robinson,
SPSS, Inc. at (800) 543-2185 x 3732 or jrobinson@spss.com. This
registration includes all conference events on Thursday and Friday,
November 17-18. Pre- and post-conference training is additional.
For more information on the conference, visit http://www.spssdirections.com.
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