Tom Moore
Grinnell College
Newsletter for the Section on Statistical Education
Volume 2, Number 1 (Winter 1996)
In preparation for the Joint Statistical Meetings I summarized the responses received by August 10. There were 100, representing slightly less than a 10% response rate. Subsequently I received an additional 13 responses. While not part of the summary considered by the Section, these 13 responses were in essential agreement with the 100 in the formal summary. The results are tabled below.
The Section's decision to publish two more years of the newsletter is certainly consistent with the survey. Notice that the results on hard vs. soft copy were more equivocal. Because of this we are going to continue to mail hard copy for these two years, giving readers the option of getting the newsletter electronically. Because of cost, we will strongly encourage our international readers to use the electronic option if feasible.
We asked for "suggested improvements" and received several good ideas. Generally a fair number of people seemed to want some articles that went beyond the informational. This issue includes a status report on statistics in the schools, a Q and A column, and a "position paper," all suggestions from readers. We still include plenty of informational articles because, while redundant in some cases to other publications, there were many positive comments about these.
The Section thanks those of you who responded to the survey.
Affiliation of respondents:
Academic, grad and undergrad 51
Academic, primarily undergrad 29
Industry/business 10
Other 10
Should the newsletter be continued?
Yes 90
No 2
Maybe 8
Do you prefer hard copy or electronic?
Electronic 53
Hard copy 36
Undecided 6
Either 5
Rate on scale of 1 (not interested) to 5 (very interested) your
interest level for articles in the future on:
Topic Mean rating
Stat Ed program at JSM 3.6
ASA education activities (e.g. QL) 4.1
Stat Ed activities of other orgs 3.7
Conference/workshop announcements 3.8
Descriptions of journals, newsletters 3.9
Should newsletter be available on the internet?
Available on internet to everyone 83
Available on internet to section members only 9
Should NOT be made available on internet 3
Tom Moore
Department of Mathematics and Computer Science
Grinnell College
Grinnell, IA 50112
PHONE: (515) 269-4206
FAX: (515) 269-4984
MOORET@AC.GRIN.EDU