The Etymology of the Word Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 248

In the late 1600s, a book was published satirizing politics in Europe. Published two decades after the end of the 30 Years’ War, it focuses on the power of the Holy Roman Empire. That book’s impact on statistics is the focus of this episode of stats and stories, with guest Wallace Ferguson.

Ferguson has taught mathematics and statistics at Chatham and Clarendon Grammar School, Kent, England since 1994. He writes book reviews for the Institute of Mathematics and Its Applications, which are published in their journal, ‘Mathematics Today’. His interests include statistical etymology and his article ‘Microscopium statisticum and the etymology of statistics’ was published in the February edition of Significance. Ferguson is currently working on a follow on article, ‘Literature, Politics and the Framing of the State, 1300 – 1648’. He was a member of The Royal Statistical Society History of Statistics committee from 2018 until this year. (10/6/2022)

Inclusive Data Collection | Stats + Stories Episode 247

Measurement accuracy is something all quantitative researchers strive for, as you want to make sure you're measuring what you want to be measuring. When it comes to gathering gender and sex data, though measurements are complicated, beyond simply teasing apart sex and gender, there's also the imperative to ensure the language and measurement tools researchers use are inclusive of all experiences. That's the focus of this episode of stats and stories with guests Dr. Dooti Roy and Suzanne Thornton.

Dr. Dooti Roy is a people leader, global product owner and a methodology statistician at Boehringer Ingelheim who enjoys developing/deploying innovative clinical research and statistical visualization tools with expertise in creating and leading dynamic cross-functional collaborations to efficiently solve complex problems. She is currently focused on research and methodological applications of Bayesian statistics, artificial intelligence and machine learning on clinical efficacy analyses, patient adherence, and dose-finding. She is passionate about promoting diversity and inclusion, mentoring, cross-cultural collaborations, and competent leadership development. She unwinds with painting, reading, traveling and heavy metal.

Suzanne Thornton professor of Statistics at Swarthmore College, a liberal arts undergraduate-only institution. As an educator, she strives to teach students to understand statistics as the language of science and prepare them to become stewards of the discipline. In 2020 she chaired an ASA presidential working group on LGBTQ+ representation and inclusion in the discipline and earlier this year, she was appointed to a three year term to serve on the National Advisory Committee for the US Census. (9/29/2022)

The Third Thirty Years of Life | Stats + Stories Episode 246

Retirement is a threshold - crossing a finish line of sorts. As a new emeritus professor. this is at the front of my mind. Our guest today knows and has studied, this third age of life; a beginning of all kinds of new activities personal, professional, and more. The third age of life is the focus of this episode of Stats and Short Stories with guest Dawn C. Carr. (9/22/2022)

A Dog’s Impact on Loneliness | Stats + Stories Episode 245

At the COVID pandemic’s seeming height, social media were filled with images and stories of people adopting pets. Individuals who might not have had time for a dog or a cat before lockdown suddenly did. Needing to walk a dog also gave people a reason to leave their homes at regular intervals. For some older adults with dogs, those regular strolls around the neighborhood may have helped keep them from having increased feelings of loneliness. That’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Dawn Carr. 

Dawn C. Carr (@DawnCCarr) is the Director of the Claude Pepper Center and an associate professor at Florida State University in the Department of Sociology. Carr is a thought leader in the field of aging, and regularly presents her research to a range of audiences through keynote speeches, policy-related presentations, and seminars with older adults and practitioners. Carr’s research focuses on understanding the factors that bolster older adults’ ability to remain healthy and active as long as possible. Much of her work is dedicated to exploring the relevance, purpose, and factors related to work engagement after age 50 and volunteer engagement. Her recent work focuses on understanding the complex pathways between health and active engagement during later life, including resilience and the impact of key transitions in health, productivity, and caregiving. (9/15/2022)

The Impact of College Vaccine Mandates | Stats + Stories Episode 244

Last academic year colleges and universities across the US struggled with whether to mandate COVID vaccinations for their students. While colleges often require vaccines, the political controversy surrounding the COVID shots made adopting a vaccine policy a complicated undertaking. But according to one study, it had a profound impact on the national COVID death toll last fall. That's the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Riley Acton.

Riley Acton is an Assistant Professor of Economics at Miami University, as well as a Research Affiliate at the Institute of Labor Economics (IZA) and the College Crisis Initiative (C2i). She is an applied microeconomist who specializes in labor economics and the economics of education. Her current work examines the causes and consequences of decisions made by higher education institutions, the effect of local labor market shocks on K-12 and college students, and the impact of school finance policies on educational outcomes. (9/8/2022)

A Half Century of Worker Health | Stats + Stories Episode 243

Some important milestones have passed during the pandemic blur of the last few years. The 50th anniversary of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) was one. Created by the Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) Act of 1970. NIOSH, one of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), was established as a “separate and independent research program to create objective scientific research findings in the field of occupational safety and health.”  Today’s episode of Stats+Stories with guest Dr. Paul Schulte.

Dr. Paul Schulte was the Director of the Division of Science Integration and Co-Manager of the Nanotechnology Research Center at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), Center’s for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). He currently is a consultant with Advanced Technologies and Laboratories International, Inc. Dr. Schulte has 47 years of experience in conducting and developing guidance on occupational cancer, nanomaterials, risk communication, workplace well-being, and genetics. He also has examined the convergence of occupational safety and health and green chemistry and sustainability. He is the co-editor of the textbook, Molecular Epidemiology: Principles and Practices. Dr. Schulte has served as guest editor of the Journal of Occupational Medicine and the American Journal of Industrial Medicine and was on the initial editorial board of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention.  He is currently on the International Advisory Board of the Annals of Occupational Hygiene. Dr. Schulte has developed various frameworks for addressing the aging workforce, burden of occupational disease and injury, well-being of the workforce, and translation research and synthetic biology and occupational risk. (9/1/2022)

Benford's Law and Election Fraud | Stats + Stories Episode 242

The issue of voter fraud has taken up increasing amounts of the public’s imagination since the 2020 election. Spurred in part by claims from former U. S. President Donald Trump that the election was stolen from him. On their face, some of the claims of fraud seem irrational. Others however require a bit of statistical investigation before they can be fully debunked. That’s the focus of this episode of Stats+Stories with guest Dr. David McCune. 

Dr. David McCune is an associate professor of mathematics at William Jewell College in Liberty, Missouri. He primarily studies problems in the field of mathematical political science, focusing on apportionment and social choice theory. He also enjoys studying games of chance, especially when Markov chains might be involved. (8/11/2022)

Anti-Racist Advocacy | Stats + Stories Episode 241

Since the summer of Black Lives Matter in 2020, institutions all over the U.S. have been exploring their pasts. In order to understand how they may have contributed to, or helped perpetuate systemic racism. Universities, private businesses and non-profits have all been working to try to understand what it means to be Anti-Racist. The American Statistical Association launched an Anti-Racism Task Force to explore this very thing, and that’s the focus of this episode of Stats+Stories with guests Dr. Adrian Coles and Dr. David Marker.

Dr. Coles is an Associate Director of Biostatistics at Bristol Myers Squibb. He is a collaborative researcher who specializes in the design and implementation of clinical trials and the interpretation of clinical trial data to facilitate the assessment of benefit/risk for promising pharmaceutical innovations. He is also a subject matter expert in diversity, equity, and inclusion and chairs the American Statistical Association’s Committee on Minorities in Statistics as well as the organization’s Anti-Racism Taskforce.

Dr. Marker is a senior statistician who recently retired after 37+ years at Westat. He is continuing to consult on topics of personal interest. He has worked on studies in the fields of public health, environmental pollution, homelessness, voting rights, and many others. He recently served as co-chair of the American Statistical Association’s Anti-Racism Task Force. Dr. Marker is an internationally recognized consultant in total quality management, having advised the Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish, South African, Dutch, and Danish Governments on improving the quality of their data collection activities. He has also appeared as an expert witness before Federal, state, and local governments and on voting rights and language-minority rights before Federal, State, and Provincial courts. (8/6/2022)

Epidemiological BRIDGE Building | Stats + Stories Episode 240

Health research is complicated, no matter the scale or the scope. Global health research, however, brings with it particular issues. For the last decade, researchers in epidemiology have been pulled between issues related to research integrity and research fairness. Bridging the two is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Sandra Alba and Susan Rumisha.

Dr. Sandra Alba is an epidemiologist at KIT Royal Tropical Institute in Amsterdam. For the past 15 years, she’s been applying statistical and epidemiological methods to evaluate public health programs in low- and middle-income countries. Her research focuses on data quality and good epidemiological practice, more specifically the interplay between research integrity and research fairness in multi-disciplinary international research collaborations.

Dr. Susan Rumisha, Senior Research Officer at Telethon Kids Institute and a biostatistician working in the field of public health and infectious disease epidemiology. Rumisha works on the Malaria Atlas Project and has over 15 years of experience in designing and conducting malaria and health system research. Her interests include applying advanced and modern statistical approaches to data from surveys, research, and routine health surveillance systems to generate evidence to guide decision-making processes in public health practice, policy formulation, and health systems performance, at national, regional and global levels. (7/28/2022)

Signing Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 239

Dr. Regina Nuzzo is a freelance science writer and professor in Washington, DC. After studying engineering as an undergraduate she earned her PhD in Statistics from Stanford University. Currently, she’s teaching statistics in American Sign Language at Gallaudet University, the world’s only liberal arts college for deaf and hard-of-hearing students.

Dr. Nuzzo is also a graduate of the Science Communication program at the University of California-Santa Cruz. Her science journalism specialties center around data, probability, statistics, and the research process. Her work has appeared in Nature, Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Reader’s Digest, New Scientist, and Scientific American, among others. (7/21/22)

Popping Filter Bubbles | Stats + Stories Episode 238

Have you ever wondered why a search engine result for undocumented workers in North Carolina provides links to worker rights sites, while a search for illegal aliens in North Carolina would lead you to immigration concern sites? Did you know that Wikipedia entries for women have a higher recommend rate of deletion than entries for men? The heart of those questions is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Dr. Francesca Tripodi.

Dr. Francesca Tripodi is a sociologist and media scholar whose research examines the relationship between social media, political partisanship, and democratic participation, revealing how Google and Wikipedia are manipulated for political gains. She is an assistant professor at the UNC School of Information and Library Science (SILS), a senior faculty researcher with the Center for Information, Technology, and Public Life (CITAP) at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and an affiliate at the Data & Society Research Institute. In 2019, Dr. Tripodi testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on her research, explaining how search processes are gamed to maximize exposure and drive ideologically based queries. Her research has been covered by The Washington Post, The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Columbia Journalism Review, Wired, The Guardian, and The Neiman Journalism Lab. (7/14/2022)

Listening Before Communicating Risk | Stats + Stories Episode 237

What do farmers in Kenya, fishers in the Philippines and teenagers in Boston have in common? They all need to balance risks when making decisions ranging from seed choice after considering predicted rainfall to life vest and chance of shark attacks to social distancing and emotional impacts. Understand risk is the focus of today’s episode of Stats+Stories with guest Tracey Brown. 

Brown is the director of Sense about Science since 2002. Under her leadership, the charity has translated the case for sound science and evidence into popular campaigns to urge scientific thinking among the public and the people who answer to them. It has launched important initiatives including AllTrials, a global campaign for the reporting of all clinical trial outcomes; and the Ask for Evidence campaign, which engages the public in requesting evidence for claims. In 2010, the Times named Tracey as one of the ten most influential figures in science policy in Britain and in 2014 she was recognized by the Science Council for her work on evidence-based policy making. In June 2017 Tracey was made an OBE for services to science, and most recently in 2020 she was made an honorary Professor at UCL in the Department of Science, Technology and Engineering in Public Policy. She is also the author of a recent article in Significance magazine describing “What is risk know-how?” (6/30/2022)

The Numbers Behind a World Cup Bid | Stats + Stories Episode 236

What does 2022 have in common with 2018 and 2026? What is special about 2023? These years include a month where work productivity will be reduced in many countries around the world. Each year will have a month when attention is split between work email and the most beautiful game. The World Cup once again draws the attention and passion of much of the world. Today’s episode focuses on the economics of global sporting events with guest Adam Beissel.

Adam Beissel (@ExtraBeissHit) is a professor of sports leadership and management at Miami University. His primary research interests include: the political economy of Sport Mega-Events; Global Politics of International Sport; Sport Stadiums and Urban Development; Social and Economic (in)justice in College Sport; Sports Labor Markets and Global Athletic Migration. Beissel is currently working on two interconnected and interdisciplinary research projects critically examining the cultural and political economies of the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup joint hosted by Australia and New Zealand and the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup joint hosted by the United States, Mexico, and Canada. (6/23/2022)

Becoming a Medical Statistician | Stats + Short Stories Episode 235

We’re pleased to have Leiden University Medical Center’s Erik van Zwet back to discuss his journey into the medical statistics field in this episode of Stats and Short Stories. (6/9/2022)  

The Winner’s Curse | Stats + Stories Episode 232

A randomized controlled trial is viewed as the golden standard in medical research, particularly as it relates to treatments or interventions. But there may be pitfalls to trusting that approach too much. That's the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Erik van Zwet.

Erik van Zwet (@erikvanzwet) is an Associate Professor in the Department of Biomedical Data Sciences of the Leiden University Medical Center where he has been since 2009. He joined the school wanting to do more applied work in the areas of statistics and data analysis and has since published multiple papers in Significance Magazine including the main focus of today’s episode, “Addressing exaggeration of effects from single RCTs”. (5/19/2022)

Big, If True | Stats + Stories Episode 234

Most articles that appear in academic journals are kind of mundane in that they’re extending the work of scholars who have come before, or sometimes taking an old theory in a new direction. There are those moment, however when a piece of research holds the possibility of fundamentally remaking a field. How should those articles be handled? What’s the ethical way to review such research? That’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Andrew German. 

Andrew Gelman (@StatModeling) is a professor of statistics and political science, and director of the Applied Statistics Center at Columbia University. His research interests include voting behavior and outcomes, campaign polling, criminal justice issues, social network structure, and statistical and research methods. He has received the Outstanding Statistical Application award three times from the American Statistical Association, the award for best article published in the American Political Science Review, and the Council of Presidents of Statistical Societies award for outstanding contributions by a person under the age of 40. (6/2/2022)

The Aging American Workforce | Stats + Stories Episode 233

In the United States, like many countries, middle-aged and older workers are increasingly a larger proportion of the workforce. The needs of these workers are different than those who are younger and can run the gamut from educational to health needs. That's the focus of this episode of Stats+Stories with guests Takashi‌ ‌Yamashita‌ and Phyllis A. Cummins

Takashi‌ ‌Yamashita‌ ‌‌is‌ ‌an‌ ‌associate‌ ‌professor‌ ‌of‌ ‌sociology,‌ ‌and‌ ‌a‌ ‌faculty‌ ‌in‌ ‌the‌ ‌Gerontology‌ ‌Ph.D.‌ ‌program‌ ‌and‌ ‌the‌ ‌Center‌ ‌for‌ ‌Aging‌ ‌Studies‌ ‌at‌ ‌University‌ ‌of‌ ‌Maryland,‌ ‌Baltimore‌ ‌County (UMBC).‌ ‌He‌ ‌also‌ ‌has‌ ‌a‌ ‌secondary‌ ‌appointment‌ ‌in‌ ‌the‌ ‌Department‌ ‌of‌ ‌Epidemiology‌ ‌and‌ ‌Public‌ ‌Health‌ ‌in‌ ‌the‌ ‌School‌ ‌of‌ ‌Medicine ‌and‌ ‌serves‌ ‌as‌ ‌an‌ ‌affiliate‌ ‌member‌ ‌of‌ ‌the‌ ‌Center‌ ‌for‌ ‌Research‌ ‌on‌ ‌Aging‌ ‌at‌ ‌the‌ ‌University‌ ‌of‌ ‌Maryland,‌ ‌Baltimore‌ ‌(UMB).‌ ‌His‌ ‌areas‌ ‌of‌ ‌research‌ ‌are‌ ‌social‌ ‌determinants‌ ‌of‌ ‌health‌ ‌and‌ ‌well-being‌ ‌over‌ ‌the‌ ‌life‌ ‌course,‌ ‌health‌ ‌literacy,‌ ‌wider‌ ‌benefits‌ ‌of‌ ‌lifelong‌ ‌learning,‌ ‌gerontology‌ ‌education‌ ‌and‌ ‌social‌ ‌statistics‌ ‌education.‌ ‌

Phyllis A. Cummins is a Senior Research Scholar Adjunct Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology & Gerontology at the Scripps Gerontology Center here at Miami University.  Her research interests include work and retirement transitions, education and training for older workers, publicly sponsored employment and training programs, the role community colleges play in education and training for older adults, skill development over the life course, and economic security in retirement. (5/26/2022)

The Statistics That Go Into City Planning | Stats + Stories Episode 231

Cities are places where continuity and change co-exist. History shapes neighborhoods and the relationships between them, while economic forces can reshape a city’s landscape and skyline. In Washington D.C., the friction between continuity and change is ever-present. The data and the research that goes into planning such a place is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories, with guest Andrew Trueblood.

Trueblood (@atrueblood) is a housing, economic development, and land use professional. Between 2018 and 2021, Andrew served as the Director of the DC Office of Planning (DCOP), where he prioritized agency efforts around housing and equity. He shepherded the update of the Comprehensive Plan and led DCOP’s support of the Mayor’s housing efforts. This included a goal of 36,000 new units by 2025, with 12,000 affordable units and area-level affordable housing targets with the goal of achieving a more equitable distribution of affordable housing. Trueblood also championed regional coordination, including through his role as Chair of the Planning Directors Technical Committee at the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments, where he helped formulate regional housing targets. (5/12/2022)

Becoming a Biostatistician | Stats + Stories Episode 230

Returning guest Conner Jackson walks us through a day in the life of the education and early career of a biostatistician.

Conner Jackson is a Research Instructor in the Department of Biostatistics and Informatics at the Colorado School of Public Health. He serves as the chair of the Education Committee for the Center for Innovative Design and Analysis and teaches a 6-week short course about statistics and data science to bench scientists. His research focuses on the analysis of correlated data, largely in the context of infectious diseases. (5/5/2022)

The Age of the Supercentenarian | Stats + Stories Episode 229

When American comedian and actor Betty White died, fans lamented the fact that she had just missed making it to her 100th birthday. They felt she’d been robbed of achieving a significant life moment. Some researchers think that this century could see more people making it to that moment and beyond. That’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Michael Pearce.

Pearce is a PhD candidate in Statistics at the University of Washington, working under the supervision of Elena A. Erosheva. His primary research interests include preference learning and developing Bayesian statistical models for social science problems. In his spare time, Michael enjoys running, biking, and paddling around the Puget Sound. (4/29/2022)

Ecological and Environmental Stats for Earth Day | Stats + Stories Episode 228

Earth day was launched in 1970 in the aftermath of several environmental disasters in the publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. It was designed to help raise awareness of environmental issues and has since grown into a global event. With this year's Earth Day taking on particular urgency in light of the most recent UN Climate Report. But what goes into the scientific research that informs this activism? What statistical tools are used to better understand the health of our environment? That's the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Philip Dixon.

Dixon is a professor of statistics at Iowa State University. Dixon’s research interests include developing and evaluating statistical methods to answer interesting biological questions. Some of his current projects are developing non-parametric estimates of prediction distributions, modeling physical activity data, and developing model-based visualizations of species composition data. (4/21/2022)

Academic Writing for Everyone | Stats + Short Stories Episode 227

Rosemary and John both have a passion for teaching. Their experience with classes ranges from mentored studies with a few students, to face-to-face classes with close to 100 students. Recently online classes that might be held synchronously or asynchronously with classes somewhere in between. What if you wanted to offer classes too many more students, who might be based anywhere around the world. Teaching at scale is the focus of this episode of Stats and Short Stories with guest Kristin Sainani. (4/14/2022)

The Statistical Detective | Stats + Stories Episode 226

No matter how careful a researcher or statistician is there's the possibility that an error made exists in reported data. The trick as a reader is figuring out how to identify errors and then understand what they might mean. Learning how to be a statistical detective is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Kristin Sainani (née Cobb).

Kristin Sainani (née Cobb) (@KristinSainani) is a professor at Stanford University. She teaches statistics and writing; works on statistical projects in sports medicine; and writes about health, science, and statistics for a range of audiences. She authored the health column Body News for Allure magazine for a decade. She is the statistical editor for the journal Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation; and has authored a statistics column, Statistically Speaking, for this journal since 2009. She teaches the popular Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) Writing in the Sciences on Coursera, and also offers an online medical statistics certificate program through the Stanford Center for Professional Development. (4/7/2022)

Predicting the Weather with Pietro the Weather Tortoise | Stats + Stories Episode 225

Meteorologists go to school to be able to predict the weather accurately, but for some people, weather prediction is a hobby. Maybe they have a trick knee that hurts when it rains or perhaps they know when a storm is coming by how the birds at their feeders are behaving. Some lucky folks have pets that can help them figure out what the weather is going to do and that’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Conner Jackson.

Conner Jackson is a Research Instructor in the Department of Biostatistics and Informatics in the Colorado School of Public Health. He serves as the chair of the Education Committee for the Center for Innovative Design and Analysis and teaches a 6-week short course about statistics and data science to bench scientists. His research focuses on the analysis of correlated data, largely in the context of infectious diseases. (3/31/2022)

In Defense of Standardized Testing | Stats + Stories Episode 224

The utility of standardized testing is under debate in the US with opponents of their use in K-12 suggesting educators are now being forced to teach to tests. In higher education, there's been a push to abandon the use of standardized tests in admissions processes. But if we throw out standardized tests completely, are we throwing away a tool that still has some value? That's a question framing this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Howard Wainer.

Howard Wainer is a statistician and research scientist with a specialization is the use of graphical methods for data analysis and communication, robust statistical methodology, and the development and application of generalizations of item response theory. After serving on the faculty of the University of Chicago, a period at the Bureau of Social Science Research during the Carter Administration, and 21 years as Principal Research Scientist in the Research Statistics Group at Educational Testing Service. He has authored more than 20 books, John’s favorite of which is Truth or Truthiness: Distinguishing Fact from Fiction by Learning to Think like a Data Scientist. (3/24/2022)

The Data Journalism Podcast | Stats + Stories Episode 223

Data Journalism is a hot topic in the news business. Reporters working in diverse media and diverse markets are increasingly being asked to work with data. What exactly makes for good data journalism and what does a reporter need to understand to use data well. Those are a few of the questions discussed on The Data Journalism Podcast and that is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guests Alberto Cairo and Simon Rogers.

Alberto Cairo (@AlbertoCairo) is a journalist and designer, and the Knight Chair in Visual Journalism at the School of Communication of the University of Miami. He is also the director of the visualization program at UM’s Center for Computational Science. He is the author of several books including his upcoming, How Charts Lie: Getting Smarter About Visual Information, Cairo currently consults with companies and institutions like Google and the Congressional Budget Office, and has provided visualization training to the European Union, Eurostat, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Army National Guard, and many others.

Simon Rogers (@smfrogers) is an award-winning data journalist, writer, and speaker. Author of Facts are Sacred, published by Faber & Faber in the UK, China, and South Korea. He has also written a range of infographics for children's books from Candlewick. Data editor on the News Lab team at Google, based in San Francisco, he is director of the Data Journalism Awards and teaches Data Journalism at Medill-Northwestern University in San Francisco and has taught at U Cal Berkeley Journalism school. (3/17/2022)

Writing the Book on R | Stats + Short Stories Episode 222

Impacting statistical and data science communities is an aspiration that many of us share. Outlets for such impact include work environments where we may collaborate with interdisciplinary teams. Other newer outlets are podcasting in a variety of publishing platforms. Today we will explore the origin story of such a contributor with guest Roger Peng.

Roger D. Peng (@rdpeng) is a Professor of Biostatistics at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and the Co-Director of the Johns Hopkins Data Science Lab. His research focuses on the development of statistical methods for addressing environmental health problems and he has made major contributions to our understanding of the health effects of indoor and outdoor air pollution. (3/10/2022)

Building a Career in Data Science | Stats + Short Stories Episode 221

Impacting the statistical data science communities has an aspiration many of us share. Outlets for such impact include work environments where we may collaborate with interdisciplinary teams as well as other newer outlets such as podcasting and a variety of publishing platforms. Today we will explore the origin story of such a contributor in Hilary Parker.

Hilary Parker (@hspter) is a Data Scientist, previously of Stitch Fix, Etsy, and the 2020 Biden for President Campaign. Her work focuses on the intersection of data science and product, from deeply understanding users to designing new experiences that depend on innovative data pipelines and client interactions. (3/3/2022)

The Best Friend on Friends | Stats + Stories Episode 220

Since the 1990’s people have been trying to figure out who’s the best friend. Is it Chandler because of his dry wit? Phoebe because of her unabashed enthusiasm? Joey because his loyalty? Well, leave it to statistics to give us a firm answer. Who’s the best friend from the show Friends is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Mathias Basner.

Mathias Basner is a professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. His primary research interests include the effects of sleep loss on cognition, population studies on sleep time and waking activities, the effects of noise on sleep and health, and astronaut behavioral health on long-duration space missions. Occasionally, he likes to take on odd projects like running a quantitative analysis on who was the best friend on the TV series Friends, or using 150 year-old data to investigate how sounds affect sleep. (2/24/2022)

Statistics Can Find Anybody | Stats + Short Stories Episode 219

From Florence Nightingale to David Cox we hear at Stats and Stories love tales of the careers of statisticians who made an impact on the world. Yes, friends in nursing, we claim Florence as part of statistics too. While those two pioneers are no longer with us, Jana Asher is here with us today in this episode of Stats and Short Stories.

Jana Asher is an Assistant Professor of Mathematics and Statistics at Slippery Rock University. She is also a Service-Learning Associate of the Office for Community-Engaged Learning at SRU, as well as outside of work, she is a member of the board of directors for the Pittsburgh Interfaith Evolutions Corporation (PIE), a non-profit organization dedicated to spreading interfaith understanding. Her research interests include questionnaire design, survey methods, record linkage, history of statistics, community-engaged education, and statistics education as well as her work with human rights and sexual violence. Within the ASA, she is currently a member of the Committee on International Relations and the Program Chair for the Section on Survey Research Methods. (2/17/2022)

Statistician with a CAUSE | Stats + Stories Episode 218

Dr. Dennis Pearl is a Professor of Statistics at Pennsylvania State University and Director of the Consortium for the Advancement of Undergraduate Statistics Education (CAUSE). Dr. Pearl's education work centers on building a national infrastructure to support instructors of statistics, developing resources for instructors in both statistics and probability education, and developing and testing new pedagogical methods.

One of the regular conversations we have at Stats and Stories is how to improve stats education, both for people who want to be statisticians, as well as for people who need to be able to understand data for their jobs or just to be able to go about their daily lives. The Consortium for the Advancement of Undergraduate Statistics Education has been working on this issue for the last 20 years. Its work is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Dennis Pearl. (2/10/2022)

The Stats of Skill vs. the Stories of Chance | Stats + Stories Episode 217

Gambling is a tricky topic. It got Pete Rose kicked out of baseball, and more recently, made news when Michigan State University announced a betting partnership with Ceasers entertainment. As with everything new media and big data have only complicated the conversations around games of skill vs. games of chance. That’s the focus of this episode of Stats+Stories with guest Dr. Mike Orkin.  

Dr. Mike Orkin is a Professor of Statistics Emeritus at California State University, where he was a professor and chair of the statistics department for many years before becoming a consultant and a nationally known authority on probability and gambling games. Since then he has appeared in numerous forms of media ranging from CBS Evening News, NBC’s Dateline, a Google Tech Talk series as well as authored serval books. (2/3/2022)

Carnegie the Statistician | Stats + Stories Episode 216

The Gilded Age in the U.S. is perhaps best known for the great men who rose to prominence at the time. Men such as John D. Rockefeller and JP Morgan, who made money hand over fist. One of those men Andrew Carnegie was not only a shrewd businessman, he was also a shrewd statistician of sorts. His legacy is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Christopher Tong. 

Christopher Tong has been a nonclinical and clinical biostatistician for 20 years, both in the pharmaceutical industry and in government.  He has a master's degree in applied statistics, and a Ph.D. in physics, from Purdue University.  He has co-authored work published in journals in fields such as fluid dynamics, atmospheric science, physiological acoustics, chemometrics, medical imaging, microbiology, and human and veterinary medicine. (1/27/2022)

Monetizing the Metaverse | Stats + Short Stories Episode 215

On a recent episode of Stats+Stories, Timandra Harkness talked with us about the rise of today’s data economy. On today’s episode of Stats and Short Stories we want to shift the focus to the future of that data economy and how advancing technologies like the metaverse will play in. (1/20/2022)

The Data Economy | Stats + Stories Episode 213

Do you remember the first time you saw a prompt in social media asking about a product you were searching for on some other online platform? How about the first time you received coupons sent from your local grocery that incentivized buying your favorite consumable items? Today’s episode of Stats+Stories focuses on the origin, expansion, and future of the data economy with guest Timandra Harkness and guest host Brian Tarran. (1/6/2022)

Harkness writes and presents BBC Radio 4 documentaries including the series FutureProofing and How To Disagree, and Are You A Numbers Person? for BBC World Service. She formed the UK’s first comedy science double-act with neuroscientist Dr. Helen Pilcher and has performed scientific and mathematical comedy from Adelaide (Australia) to Pittsburgh PA with partners including Stand Up Mathematician Matt Parker and Socrates the rat.

What is Nutrition Science | Stats + Stories Episode 214

An entire industry has grown up around nutrition and health. People pushing everything from shakes, to meal kits, to special diets. While some of the claims surrounding such products can be questionable at best, the field of nutrition science is growing. Filled with researchers who are working to truly understand the science of food that is a focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Michelle Cardel.

Dr. Cardel is an obesity and nutrition scientist, registered dietitian, the Director of Global Clinical Research & Nutrition at WW International, Inc. (formerly Weight Watchers) and a faculty member at the University of Florida (UF) College of Medicine, where she is also an Associate Director for the Center for Integrative Cardiovascular and Metabolic Diseases. Her research is focused on three areas, assessing the effects of psychosocial factors, including low social status and food insecurity, on eating behavior and obesity-related disease, the development and implementation of effective healthy lifestyle interventions with a focus on underserved populations, and improving gender equity within academia. (Date: 1/13/2022)

A Not So Standard Podcast | Stats + Stories Episode 212

Our lives are increasingly shaped by statistics and data. However, they remain concepts that can be difficult for broad audiences to understand. A number of outlets, including this one, have sprung up to help make them more accessible. Today another one, the “Not So Standard Deviations” podcast is the focus of this episode of Stats+Stories with guests Hilary Parker and Roger D. Peng.

Hilary Parker (@hspter) is a Data Scientist, previously of Stitch Fix, Etsy, and the 2020 Biden for President Campaign. Her work focuses on the intersection of data science and product, from deeply understanding users to designing new experiences that depend on innovative data pipelines and client interactions

Roger D. Peng (@rdpeng) is a Professor of Biostatistics at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and the Co-Director of the Johns Hopkins Data Science Lab. His research focuses on the development of statistical methods for addressing environmental health problems and he has made major contributions to our understanding of the health effects of indoor and outdoor air pollution. (12/16/2021)

Collecting Human Rights Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 211

When we talk about human rights we often focus on qualitative narratives; the tales of struggles faced by refugees, of rights denied to individuals during war, of the fight for clean food and water, but undergirding all those stories are statistics. Statistics that allow us to gain insight into the scope of a human rights issue, or the size of a population living through particular human rights abuses. The collection of those statistics is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Jana Asher.

Jana Asher is an Assistant Professor of Mathematics and Statistics at Slippery Rock University. She is also a Service-Learning Associate of the Office for Community-Engaged Learning at SRU, as well as outside of work, she is a member of the board of directors for the Pittsburgh Interfaith Evolutions Corporation (PIE), a non-profit organization dedicated to spreading interfaith understanding. Her research interests include questionnaire design, survey methods, record linkage, history of statistics, community-engaged education, and statistics education as well as her work with human rights and sexual violence. Within the ASA, she is currently a member of the Committee on International Relations and the Program Chair for the Section on Survey Research Methods. (12/9/2021)

COVID By Numbers | Stats + Stories Episode 210

There's so much data out there about COVID-19 it can be hard to make sense of it all. Over the last year, a couple of statisticians have been working to help the readers of the Guardian, get a handle on the numbers. Dr. Anthony Masters and Sir David John Spiegelhalter have a new book out based on their weekly blog titled Covid By Numbers: Making Sense of the Pandemic with Data, which is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories.

Dr. Anthony Masters (@anthonybmasters) is a Chartered Statistician, a Statistical Ambassador for the Royal Statistical Society, and a frequent blogger and explainer of statistical ideas. In his voluntary role as a Statistical Ambassador, Dr. Masters has contributed to BBC and Full Fact articles, among others, and he writes about statistics, survey research, and coding in R on Medium.

Sir David Spiegelhalter (@d_spiegel) is the Chair of the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication and has dedicated his work to improving the way that quantitative evidence is used in society. He is the former President of the Royal Statistical Society as well as a three-time former guest on Stats and Stories. (12/2/2021)

Inoculating Your Mind | Stats + Short Stories Episode 209

The information age has been rife with more misinformation than any other time in human history. With the dissemination and spread of fakes news is at an all-time high, can people be trained to spot and pre-bunk misinformation and fake news. That’s what we’re here to learn about on today’s episode of Stats and Short Stories with guest Sander van der Linden. (11/18/2021)

Conspiracy Dissemination Dilemma | Stats + Stories Episode 208

Social media are complicated. With some research suggesting they're important spaces for digital community building and other scholars pointing out how social media can serve to actually disconnect people from one another. A growing concern among both academics in the public is the ways in which misinformation and conspiracies move through social media networks. That is the focus of this episode of Stats+Stories with guest Sander van der Linden.

Sander van der Linden (@Sander_vdLinden_) is Professor of Social Psychology in Society in the Department of Psychology at the University of Cambridge and Director of the Cambridge Social Decision-Making Lab. His research interests center around the psychology of human judgment, communication, and decision-making. In particular, he is interested in the influence and persuasion process and how people gain resistance to persuasion (by misinformation) through psychological inoculation. He is also interested in the psychology of fake news, media effects, and belief systems (e.g., conspiracy theories), as well as the emergence of social norms and networks, attitudes and polarization, reasoning about evidence, and the public understanding of risk and uncertainty. In all of this work, he looks at how these factors shape. (11/11/2021)

A Chance for Good | Stats + Stories Episode 207

There's a lot of conversation happening about the ethical uses of data and statistics how much weight should we put on numbers at all? How thoroughly should we investigate the methodologies used to create them? And who has access to the data? A special issue of Chance focuses on statistics and data science for good and that is the topic of this episode of Stats and Stories with guests Caitlin Augustin and Matt Brems.

Caitlin Augustin (@augustincaitlin) is a Senior Director at Datakind and is responsible for delivering DataKind's core offerings, ensuring that high-quality, impactful data science interventions are created in partnership with social sector leaders. Prior to DataKind, Caitlin worked as a research scientist at a digital education company and as an engineering professor at NYU. A lifelong volunteer, she's engaged with Central Florida's nonprofit community and the organizer of the Orlando Lady Developers Meetup. 

Matt Brems is Managing Partner + Principal Data Scientist at BetaVector, a data science consultancy. His full-time professional data work spans computer vision, finance, education, consumer-packaged goods, and politics and he earned General Assembly's 2019 "Distinguished Faculty Member of the Year" award. Matt is passionate about mentoring folks in data and tech careers and volunteers for Statistics Without Borders as well as currently serves on their Executive Committee as the Marketing & Communications Director. (11/4/2021)

No One is Poisoning Your Kids' Candy, Trust the Numbers | Stats + Stories Episode 206

The costumes are ready and the annual opportunity to go out and harass your neighbors to get candy is once again upon us. Yes, it's time for Halloween. And along with Halloween comes the worry, the concern the fear that in fact, someone will be poisoning my kid’s candy. This is something that has lived with us for decades and we have someone today that will help us investigate this mystery on this episode of Stats and Short Stories with guest Joel Best. 

Best is a Professor Of Sociology And Criminal Justice At The University Of Delaware. His writing focuses on understanding how and why we become concerned with particular issues at particular moments in time–why we find ourselves worried about road rage one year, and identity theft a year or so later. He’s written about the ways bad statistics creep into public debates, and about dubious fears, such as the mistaken belief that poisoned Halloween candy poses a serious threat to our kids. Check out his books Damned Lies and Statistics, More Damned Lies and Statistics, Stat-Spotting. (10/28/2021)

The Right to Be Left Alone | Stats + Stories Episode 205

With the ubiquity of technology in our lives have come concerns over privacy, security, and surveillance. These are particularly potent in relation to what's come to be called Big Data. Navigating the complicated terrain is a constant conversation in some sectors of the tech industry, as well as academia. And it's the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with Christoph Kurz.

Kurz (@chr1stph) is a postdoc at the department of health economics at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. His research includes statistical methods for health economics and health policy, especially Bayesian methods and causal inference. Recently, he's focused on privacy research because of the increased requirements demanded by EU legislators regarding the handling and processing of health data. Kurtz has authored a piece for Significance magazine about the concept of differential privacy. (10/21/2021)

Wealth Inequality Escalation | Stats + Stories Episode 204

The issue of income inequality is one Americans continually wrestle with the COVID 19 pandemic bringing to light how housing, health, and general wellbeing are impacted by the unequal distribution of wealth. Income inequality in the United States is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Joseph Gastwirth.

Dr. Gastwirth is a Professor of Statistics and Economics at George Washington University. Over the course of his career he has written over 300 peer-reviewed articles, which have appeared in the Annals of Statistics, Journal of the American Statistical Association, Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, Econometrica, Review of Economics and Statistics, Statistical Science, Annals of Human Genetics, Human Heredity, Jurimetrics and Statistics and Public Policy. His research has covered a variety of topics in statistical methodology and applications. Of special note are: his early work on order and non-parametric statistics, his research on estimating measures of economic inequality, fairness and discrimination and on the role of statistical evidence in jury discriminations, equal employment and other types of legal cases. (10/14/2021)

The Ocean Health Index | Stats + Stories Episode 203

The health of the world's oceans is a growing concern but measuring ocean health is a complicated undertaking. Some people studying the issue focus on pollution, while others look at the health of corals or marine mammals. One project attempts to take a comprehensive picture of the health of oceans in order to provide information about Oceanic vital signs to stakeholders. The Ocean Health Index is the focus of this episode of Stats+Stories with guests Lelys Bravo and Julia Stewart Lowndes.

Lelys Bravo is a Statistics Professor at the Department of Statistics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Before that she was a member of the Science Steering Committee of the Biospherical Aspects of the Hydrological Cycle project from the International Geosphere-Biosphere Program (IGBP) and Lead author of the Millenium Ecosystem Assessment report. Her research interests include spatial and temporal analysis of environmental data, including the development of risk assessment methods to evaluate the impacts of natural hazards under potential climate change.

Julia Stewart Lowndes (@juliesquid) is a marine ecologist, data scientist, and Senior Fellow at the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS) at the University of California Santa Barbara. She champions kinder, better science in less time through open data science and teamwork. As a marine data scientist, Mozilla Fellow, and Senior Fellow at NCEAS, she has 7+ years designing and leading programs to empower science teams with skillsets and mindsets for reproducible research, empowering researchers with existing open tools and communities. She has been building communities of practice in this space since 2013 with the Ocean Health Index. (10/7/2021)

The Sports Statistic of the Year | Stats + Stories Episode 202

The COVID pandemic put many Sports on hold during 2020, but with the industry roaring back with the 2021 Summer Olympics as well as World Cup qualifier matches sports, and sports statistics, are back. Which is the perfect timing for the unveiling of the Royal Statistical Society's 2021 Sports Statistic of the Year.

Robert Mastrodomenico is a fellow of the Royal Statistical Society as well as owner and founder of his statistical consulting company Global Sports Statistics. He is also the Chair of RSS’ Statisticians for Society initiative since its inception in 2017. He is also an RSS Statistical Ambassador, which involves regular work with the media in assisting with their reporting of statistical issues. (9/30/2021)

Making Newsrooms More Data Friendly | Stats + Stories Episode 201 (from the RSS 2021 Conference)

Newsrooms all over the world are embracing data journalism – looking for unique and thoughtful ways to use data to tell stories about their communities. But is every newsroom handling data as carefully as it should be? What safeguards are in place ensure journalists are using data in ethical ways? That’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Irineo Cabreros.

Cabreros (@cabrerosic) is an associate statistician at the RAND Corporation. At RAND he has worked on projects in health care, education, fairness and equity, military personnel, substance use, incarceration, and insurance industries. He is a passionate science communicator who has written for Slate Magazine as an AAAS Mass Media Fellow. His research interests include causal inference, algorithmic equity, experimental design, survey sampling, high-dimensional statistics, latent variable modeling, and statistical genetics with his focuses areas including Labor Markets, Modeling and Simulation, Racial Equity and Survey Research Methodology among many others. (9/23/2021)

#MemeMedianMode Contest Winner! | Stats + Stories Episode 200

At Stats+Stories we're lucky to have listeners who put up with John's bad jokes and our general shenanigans. In fact, you've listened to 199 discussions of the statistics behind the stories and the stories behind the statistics. To mark our 100th episode we asked you to submit statistical headlines and a haiku won. For 200 we took to Twitter using the #MemeMedianMode hashtag and this time those that rose to the top actually memes. Today we're talking to the creators of our top two.

Nynke Krol (@krol_nynke) is a statistician at statistics Netherlands who also submitted a stance mean that caused both, John and Rosemary, to actually laughed out loud when they saw her take on data normality.

Eric Daza (@ericjdaza) is a data scientist statistician who focuses on digital health, he submitted several means to our mean, median, mode contest, including one that made me flashback to my first graduate class in research methods, on causation/correlation. (9/16/2021)

Stats on the Timeline | Stats + Stories Episode 199.75 (from the RSS 2021 Conference)

Twitter can be cacophonous at times on a given day, serious analysis of the situation in Afghanistan, news stories about climate change, and Parry Gripp’s Music for Cat Piano Volume 1 can all compete for a user’s attention. This has only become more clear during the COVID 19 pandemic as it seems almost everyone is tweeting about the disease, with varying levels of expertise. However, there have been some experts who’ve been able to tweet through the noise, we’ll talk with one of them on this Royal Statistical Society edition of Stats and Stories with guest Natalie E. Dean.

Dr. Natalie Dean (@nataliexdean) is an assistant professor in the Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics at Emory’s Rollins School of Public Health. She received her PhD in Biostatistics from Harvard University, and previously worked as a consultant for the WHO’s HIV Department and as faculty at the University of Florida. Her primary research area is infectious disease epidemiology and study design, with a focus on developing innovative trial and observational study designs for evaluating vaccines during public health emergencies. She has previously worked on Ebola, Zika, dengue, chikungunya, and now COVID-19. She received the 2020 Provost Excellent Award for Assistant Professors at University of Florida. In addition to research, she has been active in public engagement during the COVID-19 pandemic. She is verified on Twitter with over 100k followers and has authored pieces in outlets such as the Washington Post, New York Times, and Stat News. (9/9/2021)

Glass Ceilings in Academia | Stats + Stories Episode 199.5

The tenure track process at American universities is a grind – one shaped by the old adage to “Publish or perish.” But if a junior faculty member manages to successfully navigate the process, publishing as expected, learning to manage a classroom, participating in service, then they’re rewarded with tenure. Tenure is an almost permanent employment relationship at universities that’s designed to give faculty the freedom – because of their job security to pursue any area of inquiry they feel drawn to. The problem, of course, is that not everyone makes it through that grind. A growing body of research shows that women, though they receive more than 50-percent of all PhDs, are not making it through the tenure track process in the same numbers. That’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guests Michelle Cardel and Leslie McClure. 

Dr. Michelle Cardel (@MichelleCardel) is an obesity and nutrition scientist, registered dietitian, the Director of Global Clinical Research & Nutrition at WW International, Inc. (formerly Weight Watchers) and a faculty member at the University of Florida (UF) College of Medicine, where she is also an Associate Director for the Center for Integrative Cardiovascular and Metabolic Diseases. Her research is focused on three areas, assessing the effects of psychosocial factors, including low social status and food insecurity, on eating behavior and obesity-related disease, the development and implementation of effective healthy lifestyle interventions with a focus on underserved populations, and improving gender equity within academia.

Leslie McClure (@StatGirlLAM) is Professor & Chair of the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs at the Dornsife School of Public Health at Drexel University. Dr. McClure does work to try to understand disparities in health, particularly racial and geographic disparities, and the role that the environment plays in them. Her methodological expertise is in the design and analysis of multicenter trials, as well as issues of multiplicity in clinical trials. She is currently the Director of the Coordinating Center for the Diabetes LEAD Network, and the Director of the Data Coordinating Center for the Connecting the Dots: Autism Center of Excellence. In addition to her research, Dr. McClure is passionate about increasing diversity in the mathematical sciences and devotes considerable time to mentoring younger scientists. Dr. McClure also Chaired the ASA’s Task Force on Sexual Harassment and Assault, which led the way in developing policies surrounding sexual misconduct for professional organizations. (9/2/2021)

Comparing and Contrasting Professions | Stats + Short Stories Episode 199.25

John talking about statistics with his journalism colleagues, Richard and Rosemary, is the basis of what brings this show together. But speaking about, and communicating statistical work with journalists, and understanding our interdisciplinary relationship in the era of fake news and misinformation is more important than ever. That's the focus of this week’s episode of Stats and Short Stories with guest Kevin McConway.

Kevin McConway is an Emeritus Professor of Applied Statistics at the Open University in the UK, where he taught statistics, mainly to adult students in a wide range of disciplines. He has researched collaboratively across natural and social science. Kevin has developed a strong interest and involvement in statistics in the media. In particular, he was an adviser for eleven years and an occasional contributor to the BBC radio program More or Less, which aims to support the public understanding of numbers in the news. He has worked with and helped train journalists in understanding and communicating statistics, often through the UK’s Science Media Centre where he is a member of the advisory committee. He tweets on @kjm2. (8/26/2021)

Understanding "Civic Statistics" | Stats + Stories Episode 199

Being able to read and write is necessary to be successful in work, at home, and in civic life. Do parallel skills associated with critical reasoning from numbers and data carry similar weight? What do you need to know to be an informed consumer of numeric information,  and to use such information? That's the focus of this episode of Stats+Stories with guest Iddo Gal.

Iddo Gal is an Associate Professor and past-Chair, Dept. of Human Services, University of Haifa, Israel, with an MA in Personnel Psychology from Tel-Aviv University and a Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology, University of Pennsylvania. Gal enjoys multidisciplinary interests that span two fields of research and applied practice: the first being teaching/learning and assessment of adult numeracy and statistical literacy, and systemic aspects of developing related functional competencies; and the second being managerial issues in service organizations, in particular empowerment of frontline workers and empowerment of clients of service organizations, and related issues such as service satisfaction, customer complaints, and accessibility of services to diverse populations. (8/19/21)

Sounding Human When Talking About Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 198

Communicating statistics effectively can be a difficult task it can sometimes be hard to know how much information someone needs in order to understand a particular set of numbers. Jargon can be another stumbling block to clearly communicating what a statistical finding means. Communicating stats clearly is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Kevin McConway

Kevin McConway is an Emeritus Professor of Applied Statistics at the Open University in the UK, where he taught statistics, mainly to adult students in a wide range of disciplines. He has researched collaboratively across natural and social science. Kevin has developed a strong interest and involvement in statistics in the media. In particular, he was an adviser for eleven years and an occasional contributor to the BBC radio program More or Less, which aims to support the public understanding of numbers in the news. He has worked with and helped train journalists in understanding and communicating statistics, often through the UK’s Science Media Centre where he is a member of the advisory committee. He tweets on @kjm2. (8/5/2021)

The "Key" to a Successful Kickstarter | Stats + Stories Episode 197

About 20 years ago, most people would have been unfamiliar with the term crowdfunding. Now, when it comes to the arts, you can crowdfund anything from comic books to Mystery Science Theater 3 Thousand to musical compositions. What it takes to successfully crowdfund a rock project is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guests Moinak Bhaduri, Dominique Haughton and Piaomu Liu.

Dominique Haughton is a Professor of Mathematical Sciences and Global Studies at Bentley University, and an Affiliated Researcher at the Université Paris 1 (Pantheon-Sorbonne). Research interests include applied statistics, business analytics, global analytics, music analytics, data mining, and model selection. Professor Haughton’s work concentrates on how to best leverage modern analytics techniques in order to address questions of business or societal interest.

Piaomu Liu is an Assistant Professor, Mathematical Sciences at Bentley University. Her research interests include Lifetime data analysis (recurrent event & competing risks), joint dynamic modeling, and semiparametric methods.

Moinak Bhaduri is an Assistant Professor, Mathematical Sciences at Bentley University who studies spatio-temporal Poisson processes and others like the self-exciting Hawkes or log-Gaussian Cox processes that are natural generalizations. His primary interest includes developing change-detection algorithms in systems modeled by these processes, especially through trend permutations. His research has found applications in computer science, finance, reliability and repairable systems, geoscience, and oceanography. (7/29/2021)

Record Linkage | Stats + Stories Episode 196

Our lives are framed by numbers tracking our performance in school, our financial health, and our physical and emotional wellbeing. While this information can help us figure out what we might do to improve a situation, it’s only part of the statistical story. There’s other information, other data, that might be useful as well. The importance of linking data is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories, where we explore the statistics behind the stories and the stories behind the statistics with guest Katie Harron.

Harron is an Associate Professor in quantitative methods at the UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health as well as the 2021 Wood Medal recipient for, “her outstanding methodological work on record linkage.” Her research aims to develop methods to exploit the rich data that are collected about populations as we interact with services throughout our lives. Her current research links data from health, education, and social care at a national level, in order to improve our understanding of the health of individuals from birth to young adulthood. (7/22/21)

Building Back Better | Stats + Stories Episode 195

Over the course of the last year, statistics have framed our lives in very obvious ways. From COVID cases to unemployment rates, stats have helped us understand what’s happening in the wider world. As we contemplate how to “build back better” in the aftermath of the pandemic, official statistics could help guide our way, at least, that’s what the authors of a recent Significance Magazine article think. That’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Paul Allin.

Paul is a visiting professor of statistics in the department of mathematics at Imperial College London, UK. His research interests are the measurement of national wellbeing and progress, and the use of these measures in politics, policy, business, and everyday life. He also chairs the Statistics User Forum, an ‘umbrella’ organization that brings together producers and groups of users of UK official statistics. Paul previously spent forty years as a professional statistician, researcher, and policy analyst in the Office for National Statistics and other departments and agencies, including as the director of the Measuring National Wellbeing program. His social media usage is limited to LinkedIn and StatsUserNet. (7/15/20)

To P, or Not to P, That is the Question | Stats + Stories Episode 194

For years now, the utility of the P-value in scientific and statistical research has been under scrutiny – the debate shaped by concerns about the seeming over-reliance on p-values to decide what’s worth publishing or what’s worth pursuing. In 2016 the American Statistical Association released a statement on P-values, meant to remind readers that, “The P-values was never intended to be a substitute for scientific reasoning.” The statement also laid out six principles for how to approach P-values thoughtfully. The impact of that statement is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Robert Matthews.

Robert Matthews is a visiting professor in the Department of Mathematics, Aston University in Birmingham, UK. Since the late 1990s, as a science writer, he has been reporting on the role of NHST in undermining the reliability of research for several publications including BBC Focus, and working as a consultant on both scientific and media issues for clients in the UK and abroad. His latest book, Chancing It: The Laws of Chance and How They Can Work for You is available now. (7/8/2021)

A Longitudinal Legacy | Stats + Stories Episode 193

Every two years the International Prize in Statistics is given out to recognize an individual or team for major contributions to the field of statistics particularly those that have practical applications or which lead to breakthroughs in other disciplines. The winner is chosen in a collaboration between the American Statistical Association, the Institute for the Mathematical Sciences, the International Biometric Society, the International Statistical Institute, and the Royal Statistical Society. The 2021 honoree is Nan Laird and her award and career are the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories.

Laird is the Harvey V. Fineberg Professor of Biostatistics at Harvard University. During her more than forty years on the faculty, she developed many simple and practical statistical methods for pressing public health and medical problems. Her work on the EM Algorithm, with Art Dempster and Don Rubin, is among the top 100 most cited of all published articles in science. She’s also developed popular and widely used methods for meta-analysis, longitudinal data, and statistical genetics. She has worked in several areas of application including the quantification of adverse events in hospitals, childhood obesity, and genetic studies in Alzheimer’s disease, bipolar disorder, asthma, and lung disease. Laird was awarded the 2021 International Prize in Statistics for, "her work on powerful methods that have made possible the analysis of complex longitudinal studies." (7/1/2021)

The Wonders of Astrostatistics | Stats + Stories Episode 192

The universe seems unbelievably vast, a sky filled with countless stars and worlds. Well, maybe not so countless as there’s a whole field devoted to crunching the numbers associated with an ever-expanding universe. Astrostatistics is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories

Jessi Cisewski-Kehe is an assistant professor in the Department of Statistics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her research focuses on methodological development for complicated datasets of which closed-form models and likelihood functions are not able to fully capture the desirable and interesting features of the observations. Statistical challenges in astronomy, astrophysics, and cosmology (i.e., astrostatistics) are a primary focus of her work.

Chad Schafer is a professor in the Department of Statistics & Data Science at Carnegie Mellon University. Since his Ph.D. work at the University of California at Berkeley, he has worked on statistical challenges that arise in astronomy, with a particular focus on the handling of complex estimation problems. He is currently involved with the Legacy Survey of Space and Time, to be conducted at the under-construction Vera C. Rubin Observatory, co-chairing its Informatics and Statistics Science Collaboration since 2015. (6/24/2021)

STATCOM | Stats + Stories Episode 191

Where are the best locations for food pantries? What are the patterns and use of a crisis call center? How can services be improved for the senior population of Wahtenaw County in Michigan? These questions share a common denominator, they represent data and analysis needs of community service organizations. Statistics in the service of the community is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guests. Emily Morris and Tom Braun.

Tom Braun is a Professor in the Department of Biostatistics and has been a faculty advisor for STATCOM for the past three years.  Dr. Braun is an international expert in the design of Bayesian adaptive designs for oncology clinical trials, and he has more recently expanded his research into snSMART designs for clinical trials for rare diseases.  Dr. Braun has collaborated with a variety of medical and public health investigators, including bone marrow transplantation, cancer of the mouth, breast, and lungs, periodontal disease, and development of anthrax vaccines.  Tom also is an active member in University of Michigan committees working to address issues of incivility, rankism, and harassment in academia, and he also active in developing new pedagogy for teaching biostatistics and data science.

Emily Morris is a PhD candidate in the Department of Biostatistics and former co-president of Statistics in the Community (STATCOM) at the University of Michigan. In addition to the leadership role, her involvement in STATCOM projects ranges from summarizing patterns in counseling visits at a local nonprofit to identifying optimal locations for mobile food pantries in Toledo. Her research primarily involves machine learning methods applied to brain imaging analysis. (6/2/2021)

Big Data Soup | Stats + Stories Episode 190

Big data, though not new, is often talked about as though it is. It’s become something of a buzzword associated with everything from politics to record sales to epidemiology. But, not all big data is created the same, some of it might not even be that big at all. That’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Xiao-Li Meng.

Xiao-Li Meng is the Whipple V. N. Jones Professor of Statistics, and the Founding Editor-in-Chief of Harvard Data Science Review is well known for his depth and breadth in research, his innovation, and passion in pedagogy, his vision, and effectiveness in administration, as well as for his engaging and entertaining style as a speaker and writer. Meng was named the best statistician under the age of 40 by COPSS (Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies) in 2001, and he is the recipient of numerous awards and honors for his more than 150 publications in at least a dozen theoretical and methodological areas, as well as in areas of pedagogy and professional development. (5/27/21)

The Impact of Remote Learning | Stats + Stories Episode 189

Parents, educators, and activists have all raised concerns about the impact of COVID on the educational experience of students. For high school students, these issues are amplified as they consider graduation and what may come after. The impact of COVID on high school grades is a focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Harrison Schramm. 

Harrison Schramm is a Principal Research Scientist at Group W as well as President-Elect at the Analytics Society of INFORMS.  Prior to joining INFORMS he was a Senior Fellow at Center For Strategic And Budgetary Assessments and has been a leader in the Operations Research community for the past decade. His research interests lie at the intersection of data and mathematical models. (5/20/21)

Understanding What is Causing Bias Data | Stats + Stories Episode 188

Our modern understanding of big data and the increasingly sophisticated tools we have for analyzing them have opened up whole new worlds for exploration. And, sometimes, whole new avenues for the misuse of data, which has led some to wonder who should be responsible or held accountable for data misuse or data bias? That’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Charna Parkey.

Dr. Charna Parkey is a lead data scientist at Kaskada, where she works on the team to deliver a commercially available data platform for machine learning. Her interests include analysis of different language patterns as well as using data science to combat systemic oppression. She has over 15 years experience in enterprise data science and adaptive algorithms in the defense and startup tech sectors and has worked with dozens of Fortune 500 companies in her work as a data scientist. (5/13/2021)

The COVID Decade | Stats + Stories Episode 187

It’s been a little over a year of lockdowns, curfews, online schooling, mask wearing, worry and grief. The COVID-19 pandemic has brought with it an experience of collective trauma that researchers will be studying for years to come. The British Academy has launched one such study COVID-19 and Society: Shaping the COVID Decade. That’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Dr. Molly Morgan Jones. 

Dr. Molly Morgan Jones is the Director of Policy at The British Academy. She oversees all the Academy’s policy work and activities, on topics ranging from how the humanities and social sciences can shape a post-pandemic future, to purposeful business, cohesive societies, policies supporting childhood, and higher education and skills policy. Prior to joining the Academy, she worked at RAND Europe, an independent policy research institute, where she specialized in research and innovation policy as well as worked for the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). (5/6/21)

Coding in the Classroom | Stats + Stories Episode 186

Data science is becoming an ever more visible and important part of our lives with universities around the US, working to create or strengthen data science programs. At the same time there's a growing recognition of the need for data science outreach, particularly in order to reach underrepresented populations. Data science outreach is the focus of this episode of stats and stories with guest James Dickens. 

James Dickens is a Professorial Lecturer of Mathematics and Statistics at American University (Washington, D.C.) since 2014; specializing now in Data Science. Specifically, teaching graduate courses in the Data Science program. Research topics of interest focus on the usage and the applications of the R programming language and the infusion of Python as learning aid in standard classes of mathematics. (4/29/2021)

COVID-19 Vaccine Safety and Risk | Stats + Stories Episode 185

Last week the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced a pause on the distribution and use of Johnson and Johnson’s COVID vaccine. The pause amid reports that 6 women who had received the vaccine had developed rare blood clots. The concern this has brought up around J&J’s vaccine mirrors earlier concerns raised in relation to the vaccine produced by AstraZeneca. Vaccine safety is a focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Dr. Susan Ellenberg. 

Dr. Ellenberg is a Professor of Biostatistics, Medical Ethics and Health Policy, in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, Her research interests have focused on issues in the design and analysis of clinical trials, and on assessment of medical product safety. She is an associate editor of Clinical Trials as well as of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. (4/22/2021)

The Data Privacy Landscape is Changing | Stats + Stories Episode 184

Privacy is becoming an ever more potent concern as we grapple with the reality that our phones, computers, and our browser histories are filled with data that could reveal a lot about who we are – sometimes things we’d rather keep private. The issue of the privacy of data is not a new concern for researchers – in fact, whenever someone wants to work with people, oversight boards ask them about how they’ll keep data about participants private. But the data landscape for researchers and statisticians is changing and that’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guests Claire McKay Bowen and Joshua Snoke.

Claire McKay Bowen is the Lead Data Scientist of Privacy and Data Security at the Urban Institute. Her research focuses on comparing and evaluating the quality of differentially private data synthesis methods and science communication.

Joshua Snoke is an Associate Statistician at the RAND Corporation in Pittsburgh. His research focuses on applied statistical data privacy methods for increasing researchers’ access to data restricted due to privacy concerns. (4/15/2021)

Collaboration is the Best of Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 183

The best thing about being a statistician,” he said, “is that you get to play in everyone's backyard.” That famous quote by John Tukey is optimized by our guest and the focus of this episode of Stats and Short Stories with guest Walter W. Piegorsch. (4/8/2021)

The Probability of the Next Terrorist Attack | Stats + Stories Episode 182

When planning for potential disasters, we often focus on hurricanes that might ravage coastal areas or tornados and droughts that strike rural parts of the Midwest. But researchers are also working to uncover the vulnerabilities faced by urban areas and that’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Walter W. Piegorsch (4/1/2021)

How Where You Live Affects Your Health | Stats + Stories Episode 181

After over a year of being stuck in our houses. A lot of us are appreciating the outdoors on our planet a little bit more healthy environment and more our focus on this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Leslie McClure.

McClure is Professor & Chair of the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs at the Dornsife School of Public Health at Drexel University. Dr. McClure does work to try to understand disparities in health, particularly racial and geographic disparities, and the role that the environment plays in them. (3/25/2021)

An Anti-Racist Approach to Data Science | Stats + Short Stories Episode 180

Individuals and institutions around the United States are grappling with the history of racism in the country as well as the ways they themselves have contributed to it. Many are working to adopt anti-racist approaches to their work and in their everyday lives. How to be an anti-racist data scientist is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Emily Hadley.

Emily Hadley is a Research Data Scientist with the RTI International Center for Data Science. Her work spans several practice areas including health, education, social policy, and criminal justice. Emily holds a Bachelor of Science in Statistics with a second major in Public Policy Studies from Duke University and a Master of Science in Analytics from North Carolina State University. (3/18/2021)

Migration Math | Stats + Short Stories Episode 179

As COVID has ravaged the globe, it's overshadowed another ongoing global story of migration, according to new data from the International Organization for Migration, migrants make up 3.5%. of the total global population with the top five countries of origin being India and Mexico China, Russia and Syria that information and more can be found in the IOM 2020 world migration report, that's the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Marie McAuliffe.

Dr. Marie McAuliffe is the head of the Migration Research Division at IOM headquarters in Geneva and Editor of IOM’s flagship World Migration Report. She is an international migration specialist with more than 20 years of experience in migration as a practitioner, program manager, senior official and researcher. Marie has researched, published and edited widely in academic and policy spheres on migration and is on the editorial boards of scientific journals International Migration and Migration Studies, and is an Associate Editor of the Harvard Data Science Review. (3/11/2021)

Cautionary Tales | Stats + Short Stories Episode 178

Everyone has a podcast nowadays. Whether it's about sports, politics or features some of the most fascinating discussions on the current state of statistical communication in the world. No matter the topic, it seems like someone, somewhere is talking into a microphone about it. Getting someone to act on your podcast however, that's a lot more rare. Today we're here to discuss podcasting with our guest Tim Harford.

Tim Harford is an economist, journalist and broadcaster. He is author of "How To Make the World Add Up", "Messy", and the million-selling "The Undercover Economist". Tim is a senior columnist at the Financial Times, and the presenter of Radio 4's "More or Less", the iTunes-topping series "Fifty Things That Made the Modern Economy", and the new podcast "Cautionary Tales". Tim has spoken at TED, PopTech and the Sydney Opera House. He is an associate member of Nuffield College, Oxford and an honorary fellow of the Royal Statistical Society. Tim was made an OBE for services to improving economic understanding in the New Year honors of 2019. His newest book “The Data Detective” was released in the U.S. and Canada earlier this month.  (3/4/2021)

The Numbers Behind America’s Pastime | Stats + Stories Episode 177

Much of the United States is buried under snow and ice, leaving many dreaming of spring. For some – that dream of spring brings with it a longing to hear the crack of a ball on a bat or the taste of peanuts in a ballpark. With the spring thaw comes baseball season and, with it, the inevitable number crunching associated with the sport. Data and baseball is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Christopher J. Phillips.

Phillips is a historian of science at Carnegie Mellon University. His research is  on the history of statistics and mathematics, particularly the claimed benefits of introducing mathematical tools and models into new fields. He is the author of "Scouting and Scoring: How We Know What We Know about Baseball" and "The New Math: A Political History," and his work has been featured in the New York Times, Time.com, New England Journal of Medicine, Science, and Nature.  He received his Ph.D. in History of Science from Harvard University. (2/25/2021)

Everything Makes Sense with Statistics, Right? | Stats + Stories Episode 176

Our lives are framed, every day by data and statistics, though we may not always be aware of that fact. Helping us make sense of this universe of data is the goal of many an economist, statistician, and journalist. It’s also the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Tim Harford.

Harford is an economist, journalist and broadcaster. He is author of  "Messy", and the million-selling "The Undercover Economist". His newest book “The Data Detective” was released in the U.S. and Canada earlier this month. Harford is a senior columnist at the Financial Times, and the presenter of Radio 4's "More or Less", the iTunes-topping series "Fifty Things That Made the Modern Economy", and the new podcast "Cautionary Tales". Tim has spoken at TED, PopTech and the Sydney Opera House. He is an associate member of Nuffield College, Oxford and an honorary fellow of the Royal Statistical Society. Tim was made an OBE for services to improving economic understanding in the New Year honors of 2019. (2/18/21)

Love, Sex and the Pandemic | Stats + Stories Episode 175

The COVID pandemic has complicated everything from school to work to grocery shopping. The need to physically distance from people not in our homes has made it difficult to maintain friendships or causal relationships while being stuck at home with a significant other for months on end can make even the biggest house seem tiny. COVID’s impact on relationships and sex is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Debby Herbenick.

Herbenick is a sex educator, sex advice columnist, author, research scientist, children's book author, blogger, television personality, professor, and human sexuality expert in the media. Dr. Herbenick is a professor at the Indiana University School of Public Health and was lead investigator of the National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior. (2/11/21)

Lying With Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 174

If the last year’s done anything, it’s made clear how important statistics and data can be to our understanding of the world. It’s not just statisticians and public health officials pouring over things like positivity rates or infection rates, the general public’s also become more familiar with the concepts. But, sometimes, highly visible data can lead to some highly suspect conclusions. And bad data, like bad romance, can lead to bad decisions. Damned lies and dubious data are the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Joel Best.

Best is a Professor Of Sociology And Criminal Justice At The University Of Delaware. His writing focuses on understanding how and why we become concerned with particular issues at particular moments in time–why we find ourselves worried about road rage one year, and identity theft a year or so later. He’s written about the ways bad statistics creep into public debates, and about dubious fears, such as the mistaken belief that poisoned Halloween candy poses a serious threat to our kids. Check out his books Damned Lies and Statistics, More Damned Lies and Statistics, Stat-Spotting. (2/4/21)

The Recent (Regrettable) Rise of Race Science | Stats + Stories Episode 173

Race science, the belief that there are inherent biological differences between human races, has been “repeatedly debunked” in the words of the Guardian, and yet, like a pseudo-scientific hydra it raises its heard every so often. Most recently race science is the return of scientific racism is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories, where we explore the statistics behind the stories and the stories behind the statistics with guest Angela Saini.

Saini is a science journalist, author and broadcaster. She presents radio and television programs for the BBC, and her writing has appeared across the world, including in New Scientist, Prospect, The Sunday Times, Wired, and National Geographic. In 2020 Angela was named one of the world's top 50 thinkers by Prospect magazine, and in 2018 she was voted one of the most respected journalists in the UK. Her latest book, Superior: The Return of Race Science, was published in May 2019 and was a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize and the Foyles Book of the Year. (1/28/21)

Making Decisions During the Pandemic  | Stats + Stories Episode 172

Risk is a tricky thing. We like to think we understand it but when it gets down to brass tacks it can be harder to wrap your brain around things like acceptable or unacceptable risk. How do you define it how do people understand risk. The COVID-19 pandemic has only highlighted the trouble we sometimes have understanding risk, communicating risk is a focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with Baruch Fischhoff.

Fischhoff is the Howard Heinz University Professor in the Department of Engineering and Public Policy and Institute for Politics and Strategy at Carnegie Mellon University. His research focuses on judgment and decision making, including risk perception and risk analysis. Fischhoff is the author of a number of books on the subject, including Acceptable Risk and Risk: A Very Short Introduction. (1/21/21)

Sports Data in the U.K. | Stats + Stories Episode 171

What are the odds of your favorite team's victory, how much should they spend on a big name player, we discuss this other topics this on today's episode of Stats+Stories with guest Robert Mastrodomenico

Mastrodomenico is a fellow of the Royal Statistical Society as well as owner and founder of his statistical consulting company Global Sports Statistics.. He is also the Chair of RSS’ Statisticians for Society initiative since its inception in 2017. He is also an RSS Statistical Ambassador, which involves regular work with the media in assisting with their reporting of statistical issues. (1/14/21)

Octopus: A New Way To Publish | Stats + Stories Episode 170

Scientific publications drive science, well that's stating the obvious, isn't it, but the form and way it's processed is historic. It's historic in the sense that there are journals that are gatekeepers, their editors that are sending out submissions to reviewers, who are then providing comments, and then it's almost that it's set in stone and locked in place for the future. But there are challenges to this and one of the challenges is the focus of this episode of Stats+Short Stories with guest Alexandra Freeman.

Alexandra Freeman is the Executive Director of the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication, a role she took up in 2016. She previously spent 16 years working for the BBC, primarily a producer and director for BBC Science. Alexandra is passionate about bringing science to the widest possible audience. Along with working in television she has also helped develop content for computer games, social media and websites, as well as formal learning resources (1/7/2021)

The Statistics of the (Stay-at-Home) Year | Stats + Stories Episode 169

This has been a year for numbers. COVID states have been a collective obsession. Vote percentages surprising. Hours spent online ... unending. The Royal Statistical Society has run the numbers and has voted for its Stats of the Year. That’s the focus of this episode Stats and Stories with guest Jennifer Rogers.

Rogers is an experienced statistical consultant who has a special interest in the development and application of novel statistical methodologies, particularly in medicine, although her portfolio of clients cuts across a wide variety of applications. She works alongside other statisticians, clinicians, computer scientists, industry experts and regulators. (12/31/2020)

How We Understand Uncertainty | Stats + Stories Episode 168

Communicating risk is difficult at any time but during a pandemic, communicating risk well can be what keeps a disease from spreading, as one public health official has put it, like wildfire. During the COVID 19 pandemic, experts, journalists, and elected officials have all been working to find the most effective way to communicate risk to the public. Helping people understand their risks of infection – or of infecting others – can be the thing that gets them to follow mask mandates or other public health advisories. Effectively communicating risk in COVID 19 is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guests Alexandra Freeman and Claudia Schneider.

Alexandra Freeman is the Executive Director of the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication, a role she took up in 2016. She previously spent 16 years working for the BBC, primarily a producer and director for BBC Science. Alexandra is passionate about bringing science to the widest possible audience. Along with working in television she has also helped develop content for computer games, social media and websites, as well as formal learning resources.

Claudia Schneider is a postdoctoral research associate with the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication and the Cambridge Social Decision-Making Laboratory. At the Winton Centre she studies the communication of uncertainty about evidence to various stakeholders, particularly the unquantified ‘quality of the underlying work. Her research focus lies at the intersection of decision science and applied social psychology. Her work uses a combination of methods ranging from quantitative laboratory surveys to field studies in diverse cultural and social settings. (12/17/2020)

Statisticians for Society | Stats + Stories Episode 167

Data can be powerful and persuasive rhetorical tools for nonprofits as they explain the work they day and ask for monetary support from various entities, but not all nonprofits can afford to hire a statistician to crunch numbers for them. An organization in the UK is working to meet the statistical needs of nonprofits and is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Robert Mastrodomenico.

Mastrodomenico is a fellow of the Royal Statistical Society as well as owner and founder of his statistical consulting company Global Sports Statistics.. He is also the Chair of RSS’ Statisticians for Society initiative since its inception in 2017. He is also an RSS Statistical Ambassador, which involves regular work with the media in assisting with their reporting of statistical issues. (12/10/2020)

The Last Legs of Local Journalism | Stats + Stories Episode 166

Cities and small towns across America once woke up to their local newspaper on their doorstep. Over the last several decades, though, those newspapers have begun to disappear – a University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill study showing that disappearance has heralded the rise of news deserts in the United States. That’s the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Penelope Abernathy. 

Abernathy, is a former executive at The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, is the Knight Chair in Journalism and Digital Media Economics at the University of North Carolina. She is author of “News Deserts and Ghost Newspapers: Will Local News Survive?” — a major 2020 report that documents the state of local journalism, what is as stake for our democracy, and the possibility of reviving the local news landscape. (12/3/2020)

The Women of Hull House | Stats + Short Stories Episode 165

Of all places to look for statistics, who’d have thought a settlement house would be a place that you would find insight into data of their communities. However, that’s the focus of this episode of Stats+Short Stories with guest Sharon Lohr.

Lohr researches and writes about statistics: where they come from, how to interpret them, and how to tell the good statistics from the bad. After receiving her Ph.D. in statistics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, She now does freelance statistical consulting and writing. See the feature article about Sharon in the September 2018 issue of Amstat News. (11/17/20)

Monitoring Health Data | Stats + Stories Episode 164

When an individual is admitted to a hospital they are quite often hooked up to a pan plea of monitoring devices all designed to help the doctors and nurses caring for them meet their medical needs. Increasingly hospitals are exploring how machine learning can help them better monitor patient vital signs and that’s a focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest and host of the Pod of Asclepius, Glen Wright Colopy. (11/12/20)

What it's Like Reporting on Statistics for the BBC | Stats + Stories Episode 163

Being able to effectively communicate data is becoming an increasingly important part of a journalists job, so much so that news outlets are expanding their staffs to include data scientists and statisticians and that is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Robert Cuffe.

Cuffe is the head of statistics for BBC news. Before that he worked on HIV drug trials at GlaxoSmithKline and is head of statistics at ViiV Health Care. Cuffe is a statistical ambassador for the Royal Statistical Society and was chairman of the UK pharmaceutical statistician’s industry body PSI where he worked with the Science Media Center to set up a briefing service for the Lay Science Press. His research interests deal primarily with health statistics and the general communication of statistics as a whole. (11/05/20)

Can You Still Predict Elections? | Stats + Stories Episode 162

With the 2020 U-S presidential election all but upon us, media are rife with prognostications about which way voters are going to swing. Will reliably red states stay red or will voters produce a blue wave that crashes across the country? Will economic uncertainty trump concerns over COVID 19? Is political polarization really as set-in-stone as some have suggested? Understanding voter behavior is a focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Andrew Gelman.

Andrew Gelman is a professor of statistics and political science at Columbia University. He has received the Outstanding Statistical Application award three times from the American Statistical Association, the award for best article published in the American Political Science Review, and the Council of Presidents of Statistical Societies award for outstanding contributions by a person under the age of 40. (10/29/2020)

Teaching Statistics After Apartheid  | Stats + Stories Episode 161

Stats professors and teachers continually looking for the best way to help their students connect to the subject. It can be a complicated process becoming even more fraught during moments of political upheaval or revolutionary change. That's the focus of this episode of stats and stories with guest Delia North.

Delia North is the Dean and Head of the School of Mathematics, Statistics and Computer Science at University of KwaZulu Natal. She has over 25 years’ experience in the teaching and design of Statistics curricula at university. Her passion for teaching Statistics has resulted in her becoming a leading figure in South African Statistics Education circles, evidenced by being Theme Chair, Topic Chair, Session Organizer and Guest Speaker at various international conferences on Statistics Education. (10/22/2020)

2020 Census Concerns | Stats + Stories Episode 160

The US Census Bureau is conducting its annual count of the American population this year. Concerns have emerged about this particular census and these have included potential impact of a citizenship question. The current status of the 2020 Census is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Rob Santos

Santos is vice president & chief methodologist at the Urban Institute as well as President-Elect of American Statistical Association. He has over 40 years of experience designing research and evaluation studies as well as sample surveys.  His expertise includes quantitative and qualitative research design, sampling, survey operations, and statistical analysis; specialty areas include Hispanics, blacks, undocumented immigrants, and other disadvantaged populations. (10/15/20)

Planning for a Pandemic | Stats + Stories Episode 159

There are a lot of facts and figures to sift through when it comes to the COVID 19 pandemic – there are death rates and infection rates to consider, as well as the paths of infection in a particular community. Investigating the pandemic is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guests Ron Fricker and Steve Rigdon.

Dr. Ronald D. Fricker, Jr. is a Professor of Statistics and the Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs and Administration in the Virginia Tech College of Science. He holds a PhD and an MA in Statistics from Yale University, an MS in Operations Research from The George Washington University, and a bachelor’s degree from the United States Naval Academy. He is a co-author  of Introduction to Statistical Methods for Biosurveillance published by Cambridge University Press. 

Steve Rigdon is a Professor of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at Saint Louis University College for Public Health and Social Justice where he teaches about Baysian statistical methods. His research interests include Biosurveillance; models for election prediction; quality; survival analysis. He is the other co-author of Introduction to Statistical Methods for Biosurveillance published by Cambridge University Press. (10/8/20)

Crime Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 158

If you’ve been following the news much then you may have noticed reporters beginning to explore how COVID is impacting crime rates around the country. . One of the problems becomes tying those changes directly to COVID and of course, a long-standing issue when it comes to crime rates is understanding how we measure crime in the first place. Measuring crime is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Sharon Lohr.

Lohr researches and writes about statistics: where they come from, how to interpret them, and how to tell the good statistics from the bad. She now does freelance statistical consulting and writing. See the feature article about Sharon in the September 2018 issue of Amstat News. (10/1/2020)

Big Data and Big Laughs | Stats + Stories Episode 157

Statistics is generally a field not known for its humor, at least to the broad public. Which is a shame because humor is a way to make complicated subjects – like statistics or big data – accessible to general audiences. The intersection of humor and stats is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Timandra Harkness,

Harkness writes and presents BBC Radio 4 documentaries including the series FutureProofing and How To Disagree, and Are You A Numbers Person? for BBC World Service. She formed the UK’s first comedy science double-act with neuroscientist Dr. Helen Pilcher, and has performed scientific and mathematical comedy from Adelaide (Australia) to Pittsburgh PA with partners including Stand Up Mathematician Matt Parker and Socrates the rat. (9/24/2020)

How to Understand the World Better With Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 156

We live at a curious moment, when data and information from a variety of sources overwhelm our senses and when there are people who are working to manipulate some of that data, spreading disinformation and discord. Overcoming that distrust and helping people see how the world adds up is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Tim Harford.

Harford is an economist, journalist and broadcaster. He is author of "How To Make the World Add Up", "Messy", and the million-selling "The Undercover Economist". Tim is a senior columnist at the Financial Times, and the presenter of Radio 4's "More or Less", the iTunes-topping series "Fifty Things That Made the Modern Economy", and the new podcast "Cautionary Tales". (9/17/2020)

Statisticians React to the News | Stats + Stories Episode 155

There's a lot of statistical information shared every day in news stories. Everything from COVID cases to economic data is Quantified help us better understand our world. But do news presentations really help us do that? And what do statisticians think about the way journalists are covering their work, that’s the topic behind this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Megan Higgs and Ashley Steel.

Megan Higgs is a statistician, freelancer, and owner of Critical Inference. She has experience in academic research and teaching, as well as consulting and scientific collaboration in many disciplines. She believes in the importance of raising awareness about limitations of current uses of statistical methods and inference in scientific practice and communication.

Ashley Steel is a statistician and quantitative ecologist with experience in academia, government and international organizations. She wrote “The Truth About Science: A Curriculum for Developing Young Scientists” which guides middle school students through the process of conducting research. She also designed and taught a course on statistical thinking at the University of Washington, Seattle, where she is affiliate faculty. Passionate about the value of probabilistic thinking in every-day decision making, she volunteers at science fairs and supports teachers in understanding statistics. (9/10/2020)

19th Century Data Visualization | Stats + Stories Episode 154

Data visualization is a skill that's becoming increasingly important. In feels as wide-ranging as Education, Medicine and Journalism. It's also something that can seem incredibly complicated and imitating.The arguments made by such visualisations is a focus of this episode of Stats and Stories where we explore the statistics behind the stories with guest Alison Hedley.

Alison Hedley has a PhD in Communication and Culture and holds a SSHRC (Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada) postdoctoral fellowship at McGill University. Her current research addresses the history of data visualization in popular journalism, focusing especially on Victorian and Edwardian Britain. She is editor of the Yellow Nineties Personography, a biographical database about authors and artists of the 1890s.(9/3/2020)

Teaching Better | Stats + Stories Episode 153

Recent COVID-forced move to online instruction for both K through 12 and higher-ed has come an intense discussion of best teaching practices in digital spaces. While the focus has been on teaching online, the conversation has foregrounded long-standing debates over pedagogy and practice in education. Understanding what works in the classroom is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Ellen Yezierski.

Dr. Ellen Yezierski is the Professor of Chemistry and Director of Teaching Excellence at Miami University. Her research interests include inquiry instruction, teacher change, and the effects of high school teacher professional development on teachers and their students. (8/27/2020)

News Deserts | Stats + Stories Episode 152

Journalists are tasked with helping citizens understand how their communities are run. However, that’s becoming increasingly difficult as local new rooms around the country shrink or are shuttered completely. Journalism and news deserts are the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Tom Stites

Tom Stites is a seasoned writer, editor and entrepreneur with a passion for strengthening journalism and democracy.  Currently he is a consulting editor for the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and the founder and president of the Banyan Project  which aims to strengthen democracy by pioneering a sustainable and easily replicable new model for Web journalism. (8/20/2020)

The State of Human Rights in the Pandemic | Stats + Stories Episode 151

Almost every day we seem to get new data about the COVID crisis. Whether it’s infection rates, death rates, testing rates, false-negative rates, there’s a lot of information to cull through. Making sense of COVID data is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with Megan Price and Maria Gargiulo.

Megan Price is the Executive Director of the Human Rights Data Analysis Group, Price designs strategies and methods for statistical analysis of human rights data for projects in a variety of locations including Guatemala, Colombia, and Syria. Her work in Guatemala includes serving as the lead statistician on a project in which she analyzed documents from the National Police Archive; she has also contributed analyses submitted as evidence in two court cases in Guatemala. Her work in Syria includes serving as the lead statistician and author on three reports, commissioned by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR), on documented deaths in that country. @StatMegan

Maria Gargiulo is a statistician at the Human Rights Data Analysis Group. She has conducted field research on intimate partner violence in Nicaragua and was a Civic Digital Fellow at the United States Census Bureau. She holds a B.S. in statistics and data science and Spanish literature from Yale University. She is also an avid tea drinker. You can find her on Twitter @thegargiulian. (8/13/20)

Messaging Medicine | Stats + Stories Episode 150

The work of health researchers is vitally important to the safety and well-being of people around the world, with the COVID-19 crisis making that all too clear. However, health researchers are facing a crisis of their own, a crisis of trust.The issue of trust and health research is a focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with guest Sandra Alba. Alba is an epidemiologist at KIT Royal Tropical Institute with a background in medical statistics. She has 15 years’ experience in the application of statistical and epidemiological methods to evaluate public health programs primarily low- and middle-income countries. (8/6/20)

Measuring Performance | Stats + Stories Episode 149

The use of statistics to improve processes and business industry government and academia is the focus of this episode of Stats and Stories with Deming Lecturer Award winner Nick Fisher. Fisher left his position as Chief Research Scientist at CSIRO  in 2001 to found ValueMetrics Australia, an R&D consultancy that carries out R&D in Performance Measurement, in which area he has consulted to a wide variety of business, industry and Government clients in Australia and overseas. (7/30/20)

Official Statistics in Asia and the Pacific | Stats + Stories Episode 148

Gemma Van Halderen explains how Economic Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific operates. Van Halderen is Director of the Statistics Division in the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP). Prior to joining ESCAP in June 2018, Gemma was a member of the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) Executive Team, leading the transformation of ABS’ statistical programs and implementation of modernized statistical capabilities. (7/23/20)

Risk Assessment Biases | Stats + Stories Episode 147

Tarak Shah sheds light on the data used in pre trial risk assessment models. Shah is a data scientist at HRDAG, where he cleans and processes data and fits models in order to understand evidence of human rights abuses. Prior to his position at HRDAG, he was the Assistant Director of Prospect Analysis at University of California, Berkeley, in the University Development and Alumni Relations, where he developed tools and analytics to support major gift fundraising. (7/16/20)

Statistical Summer Transportation Safety | Stats + Short Stories Episode 146

Joel Greenhouse explains some rules of thumb for when you’re on the road traveling. (7/9/20)

'13 Reasons Why' Association with Youth Suicide | Stats + Stories Episode 144

Joel Greenhouse discusses his work as part of a team that studied the potential impact of a popular series '13 Reasons Why' on suicides in young people. (6/25/20)

Pets During Quarantine | Stats + Stories Episode 145

Allen McConnell talks about how relationships with family and pets affect health and well-being, how people decode others’ nonverbal displays, and how self-nature representations influence pro-environmental action. McConnell is University Distinguished Professor and Chair of the Department of Psychology at Miami University.  (7/2/20)

Big Data Policing | Stats + Stories Episode 143

Sarah Brayne uses qualitative and quantitative methods to examine the social consequences of data-intensive surveillance practices. Her forthcoming book, Predict and Surveil: Data, Discretion, and the Future of Policing, draws on years of ethnographic research of the Los Angeles Police Department to understand how law enforcement uses predictive analytics and new surveillance technologies (6/18/20)

The Most-Viewed Washington Post Article Ever | Stats + Stories Episode 142

Harry Stevens joined The Washington Post as a graphics reporter in 2019. His story featuring a simulation of pandemic spread in a closed population and the impact of social distancing. (6/11/20)

A Better Way to Test for Coronavirus | Stats + Stories Episode 141

Nick Fisher left his position as Chief Research Scientist at CSIRO  in 2001 to found ValueMetrics Australia, an R&D consultancy that carries out R&D in Performance Measurement, in which area he has consulted to a wide variety of business, industry and Government clients in Australia and overseas. He is a Past President of the Statistical Society of Australia and of ISBIS, and was founding Editor-in-Chief of the ISI online journal Stat.

Dennis Trewin was trained as a Statistician but has had 40 years of executive management experience in official statistics in Australia and New Zealand. He was the Australian Statistician from 2000 to 2007. He has also been an Electoral Commissioner and an Associate Commissioner at the Productivity Commission. He has chaired and been a member of Boards/Councils in the superannuation and university sectors. He is the current Chair of the Australian Mathematics Trust. (6/4/20)

Kid’s Questions for a Statistician | Stats + Stories Episode 140

LaToya Jennings-Lopez hosts this special episode of Stats+Stories with the children of Howard W. Bishop middle school. Listen to Alyana and Collin ask our host John Bailer and other special guest Wendy Martinez about their careers in Statistics, and how young people can get involved early. From topics such as future job prospects to COVID-19’s impact, listen to what kids curious in numbers want to know. (5/21/20)

The Lady with a Lamp | Stats + Stories Episode 139

Lynn McDonald is a professor emerita at the University of Guelph. McDonald’s career has focused on enduring contributions as a scholar and social activist. She also served as a member of Parliament when her Non-Smokers’ Health Act of 1988 led the world in enacting legislation to establish smoke-free work and public spaces. In addition, in a labor of love, she published the definitive collection of Florence Nightingale’s writings, bringing renewed attention to this important female icon for a new generation. (5/14/2020)

The Decade of Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 138

Steve Pierson is director of science policy for the American Statistical Association where he works to raise the profile of statistics in policymaking and advocates on the interests of statisticians. He was previously head of government relations at the American Physical Society and associate professor of physics at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Follow him on Twitter. (5/7/2020)

Birds of Probability | Stats + Stories Episode 137

Amalia Bastos is a biologist and photographer who is currently a Ph.D candidate at The University of Auckland. She is part of the Animal Minds lab and work with three different species: dogs, kea, and New Caledonian crows. Her main interest is on how evolutionary pressures have shaped the minds of different species. Her PhD thesis focuses on the signature-testing approach, which aims to identify which cognitive processes animals use to understand their environment. (4/30/2020)

The Problem with Plastics | Stats + Stories Episode 136

Roland Geyer is Professor at UCSB’s Bren School of Environmental Science and Management. Prior to joining the Bren School he held research positions in Germany, France, and the UK. Since 2000 he has worked with a wide range of governmental organization, trade associations, and companies on environmental sustainability issues. Roland has won multiple awards for his work, such as the International Statistic of the Year, and been featured widely in the media, like CBS 60 Minutes, CBS Sunday Morning, and PBS News Hour. He has a graduate degree in physics and a PhD in engineering. Learn more about Roland and his work on his website. (4/23/2020)

Observing Extreme Environmental Events | Stats + Stories Episode 135

Dan Cooley is a Professor or Statistics at Colorado State University and is a past member and chair of the ASA’s Advisory Committee on Climate Change Policy.  Dan’s research is primarily focuses on developing statistical methods for the study of extreme values and is largely motivated by problems in atmospheric science.

Dr. Michael F. Wehner is a senior staff scientist in the Computational Research Division at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Dr. Wehner’s current research concerns the behavior of extreme weather events in a changing climate, especially heat waves, intense precipitation, drought and tropical cyclones. (4/16/20)

How To Be An Ethical Data Journalist  | Stats + Stories Episode 134

Bekah McBride is a science writer and communications specialist who has worked with both companies and universities to turn data and research into applicable and actionable messages that inspire change. She holds a B.S. in Life Science Communication with an emphasis in Business from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a M.A. in Journalism from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Her work has been published on DataJournalism.com and in Significance. (4/9/20)

Statistics are a Human Right | Stats + Stories Episode 133

John Pullinger is the current president of International Association for Official Statistics (IAOS) and finished his five-year term as United Kingdom National Statistician, Head of the Government Statistical Service (GSS) and Chief Executive of the UK Statistics Authority in June 2019. There, his role was to safeguard the production and publication of high quality official statistics by all departments, agencies and institutions in the UK. On appointment he described his role as to, “mobilize the power of data to help Britain make better decisions.” (4/2/20)

Coronavirus Visualizations  | Stats + Stories Episode 132

Amanda Makulec is the Senior Data Visualization Lead at Excella and holds a Masters of Public Health from the Boston University School of Public Health. She worked with data in global health programs for eight years before joining Excella, where she leads teams and develops user-centered data visualization products for federal, non-profit, and private sector clients. Amanda volunteers as the Operations Director for the Data Visualization Society and is a co-organizer for Data Visualization DC. Find her on Twitter at @abmakulec. (3/26/20)

Teaching Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 131

Gail Burrill is currently the Academic Specialist in the Program for Mathematics Education at Michigan State University. She was a secondary teacher and department chair in suburban Milwaukee, Wisconsin for over 28 years. She is the Immediate Past President of the International Association for Statistical Education, served as President of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and as Director of the Mathematical Sciences Education Board. Burrill co-chaired the College Board Commission on the Calculus Framework and is currently chair of the College Board’s Advanced Placement Calculus Development Committee. (3/19/20)

Florence Nightingale and Coronavirus | Stats + Stories Episode 130

Vicki Hertzberg is a Professor at Emory University in the Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing, where she has founded and directs the Center for Data Science. Her research focuses on, “developing and applying statistical methods for the analysis of network data as well as microbiome data.” Specific topics include infectious diseases on networks, dynamic networks and microbiome of the airplane cabin. (3/12/2020)

White Hat Bias | Stats + Stories Episode 129

David B. Allison is the current dean, distinguished professor, and provost professor at the Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington. Prior to Indiana University, Allison was a distinguished professor, Quetelet Endowed Professor, and director of the NIH-funded Nutrition Obesity Research Center (NORC) at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). Allison has published more than 500 scientific papers with research interests including obesity and nutrition, quantitative genetics, clinical trials, statistical and research methodology, and research rigor and integrity. (3/5/2020)

Reporting on the Census | Stats + Stories Episode 128 

Hansi Lo Wang is a national correspondent for NPR based in New York City. He reports on the people, power and money behind the 2020 census. Wang received the American Statistical Association's Excellence in Statistical Reporting Award for covering the Census Bureau and the Trump administration's push for a citizenship question. Check out his work on NPR and follow him on Twitter. (3/27/2020)

The Math Behind Prescription Drugs | Stats + Stories Episode 127

Dr. Stephen Ruberg was in the pharma industry for 38 years where he worked in all phases of drug development and commercialization – from R&D to Business Analytics. In his last 10 years at Lilly, he formed the Advanced Analytics Hub for which he was the Scientific Leader and ultimately the Distinguished Research Fellow. He retired from Lilly at the end of 2017. Since his retirement, he has formed his own consulting company, Analytix Thinking, which is dedicated to teaching good statistical principles and consulting on analytical strategies for organizations. (2/20/2020)

The Science of Sex | Stats + Stories Episode 126

Debby Herbenick is a sex educator, sex advice columnist, author, research scientist, children's book author, blogger, television personality, professor, and human sexuality expert in the media. Dr. Herbenick is a professor at the Indiana University School of Public Health and was lead investigator of the National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior. (2/13/2020)

Rage Against the Machine Learning | Stats + Stories 125

Cynthia Rudin is a professor of computer science, electrical and computer engineering, and statistical science at Duke University. Previously, Prof. Rudin held positions at MIT, Columbia, and NYU. Her degrees are from the University at Buffalo and Princeton University. She is a three-time winner of the INFORMS Innovative Applications in Analytics Award. She has served on committees for INFORMS, the National Academies, the American Statistical Association, DARPA, the NIJ, and AAAI. (2/6/2020)

The Philosophy of Biostatistics | Stats + Stories Episode 124

The Stats Behind Your Medical Care | Stats + Stories Episode 121

Dr. Harrell received his PhD in Biostatistics from UNC in 1979. Since 2003 he has been Professor of Biostatistics, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, and was the department chairman from 2003-2017. He is also the Expert Statistical Advisor for the Office of Biostatistics for FDA CDER. He is Associate Editor of Statistics in Medicine, a member of the Scientific Advisory Board for Science Translational Medicine, and a member of the Faculty of 1000 Medicine. He is a Fellow of the American Statistical Association and winner of the Association's WJ Dixon Award for Excellence in Statistical Consulting for 2014. (1/9/2020 1/30/2020)

The 2020 Census: A Bellwether for the Future | Stats + Stories Episode 123

Robert Santos is vice president & chief methodologist at the Urban Institute as well as President-Elect of American Statistical Association. He has over 40 years of experience designing research and evaluation studies as well as sample surveys. His expertise includes quantitative and qualitative research design, sampling, survey operations, and statistical analysis; specialty areas include Hispanics, blacks, undocumented immigrants, and other disadvantaged populations. (1/23/2020)

Communicating Uncertainty | Stats + Stories Episode 122

Louise Ryan is an Australian biostatistician, a distinguished professor of statistics in the School of Mathematical Sciences at the University of Technology Sydney, She is known for her work applying statistics to cancer and risk assessment in environmental health. Louise is also the Editor in Chief of Statistics in Medicine. She has received a number of prestigious awards and honors, most recently her 2012 election to the Australian Academy of Science, a 2015 honorary doctorate from Ghent University, Harvard’s 2015 Centennial Medal and her new role as President of the International Biometrics Society. (1/16/2020)

The Stats of the Decade | Stats + Stories Episode 120

Iain Wilton directs the Royal Statistical Society’s policy, public affairs and external relations work. His team’s responsibilities include the production of our member newsletter, Significance magazine and the RSS’s policy briefing papers for MPs and peers. Iain’s team also organises the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Statistics as well as the RSS Statistical Ambassador network and our annual Statistical Excellence Awards. Iain has a doctorate from Queen Mary, University of London and has previously worked for the BBC, the Cabinet Office and the University of Essex. He has also written a biography of the sportsman, writer and politician CB Fry. (Date: 1/2/2020)

How to Make Data Journalism Better | Stats + Stories Episode 119

Data is the New Punk| Stats + Stories Episode 118

Simon Rogers is an award-winning data journalist, writer and speaker. Author of ‘Facts are Sacred‘, published by Faber & Faber in the UK, China and South Korea. He has also written a range of infographics for children books from Candlewick. Data editor on the News Lab team at Google, based in San Francisco, he is director of the Data Journalism Awards and teaches Data Journalism at Medill-Northwestern University in San Francisco and has taught at U Cal Berkeley Journalism school. (Date: 12/12/2019 & 12/19/2019)

Germs on a Plane | Stats + Stories Live!

Vicki Hertzberg is a Professor at Emory University in the Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing, where she has founded and directs the Center for Data Science. Her research focuses on, “developing and applying statistical methods for the analysis of network data as well as microbiome data.” Specific topics include infectious diseases on networks, dynamic networks and microbiome of the airplane cabin. (Date: 11/21/2019)

Making ASA Initiatives Stick | Stats + Stories Live!

Wendy Martinez has been serving as the Director of the Mathematical Statistics Research Center at the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) for six years. Prior to this, she served in several research positions throughout the Department of Defense. She held the position of Science and Technology Program Officer at the Office of Naval Research, where she established a research portfolio comprised of academia and industry performers developing data science products for the future Navy and Marine Corps. Wendy is also proud and grateful to have been elected as the 2020 ASA President. (Date: 11/14/2019)

Why's It So Hard To Count the Unemployed? | Stats + Short Stories Episode 117

The Importance of Official Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 116

Chaitra Nagaraja is Associate Professor of Statistics at the Gabelli School of Business at Fordham University. Prior to joining Fordham, she was a researcher at the U.S. Census Bureau. She combined her various research interests with her love of history in a new book, Measuring Society, which explores the history and measurement of official statistics. (Date: 10/31/2019)

From the Royal Statistical Conference | A Stats + Stories Special Episode Part 2

From the Royal Statistical Conference | A Stats + Stories Special Episode Part 1

This two episodes features a number of interviews from the recent Royal Statistical Society International Conference from last month. In collaboration with the Royal Statistical society and Significance Magazine. (Date: 10/17/2019 10/24/2019)

Getting Introduced to Programming at a Young Age | Stats + Stories Episode 115

How the Bureau of Labor Statistics Gets its Data | Stats + Stories Episode 113

Wendy Martinez has been serving as the Director of the Mathematical Statistics Research Center at the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) for six years. Prior to this, she served in several research positions throughout the Department of Defense. She held the position of Science and Technology Program Officer at the Office of Naval Research, where she established a research portfolio comprised of academia and industry performers developing data science products for the future Navy and Marine Corps. Wendy is also proud and grateful to have been elected as the 2020 ASA President. (Date: 9/26/2019 10/10/2019)

Past, Present and Future of Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 114

Introducing The Harvard Data Science Review | Stats + Stories Episode 112

Xiao-Li Meng, the Whipple V. N. Jones Professor of Statistics, and the Founding Editor-in-Chief of Harvard Data Science Review, is well known for his depth and breadth in research, his innovation and passion in pedagogy, his vision and effectiveness in administration, as well as for his engaging and entertaining style as a speaker and writer. Meng was named the best statistician under the age of 40 by COPSS (Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies) in 2001, and he is the recipient of numerous awards and honors for his more than 150 publications in at least a dozen theoretical and methodological areas, as well as in areas of pedagogy and professional development. (Date: 9/19/2019 10/3/2019)

So What is Guinnessometrics? | Stats + Stories Episode 111

Stephen T. Ziliak is Professor of Economics at Roosevelt University and Conjoint Professor of Business and Law at the University of Newcastle-Australia. A major contributor to the American Statistical Association “Statement on Statistical Significance and P-values” (2016) he is probably best known for his book (with Deirdre N. McCloskey) on The Cult of Statistical Significance: How the Standard Error Costs Us Jobs, Justice, and Lives (2008), showing the damage done by a culture of mindless significance testing, the history of wrong turns, and the benefits which could be enjoyed by returning to Bayesian and Guinnessometric roots. (Date: 9/12/2019)

Who’s Behind These Gig Economy Jobs? | Stats + Stories Episode 110

Siddharth Suri is a computational social scientist whose research interests lie at the intersection of computer science, behavioral economics, and crowdsourcing. His current work centers around the crowd workers who power many modern apps, websites, and artificial intelligence (AI) systems. This work culminated in a book he coauthored with Mary L. Gray titled Ghost Work: How to Stop Silicon Valley from Building a New Global Underclass (9/5/2019).

Measuring the Data that Shapes Public Policy | Stats + Stories Episode 109

Back to School Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 107

Libby Pier and Nichole Webster are Researchers at Education Analytics. Pier oversees and executes EA's diverse educational research portfolio, encompassing social-emotional learning, predictive analytics, academic growth measures, human capital analytics, and program evaluation. Webster examines the item properties and performance of Social and Emotional Learning surveys and estimates teacher and school performance metrics in R. She’s part of ongoing research that examines how Item Response Theory models estimate error. (8/15/2019 & 8/29/2019)

The False Discovery Rate | Stats + Stories Episode 108

Yoav Benjamini is the Nathan and Lily Silver Professor of Applied Statistics at the Department of statistics and Operations Research at Tel Aviv University. He is a co-developer of the widely used and cited False Discovery Rate concept and methodology. He received the Israel Prize for research in Statistics and Economics, is a member of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, and has been elected to receive the Karl Pearson Prize of ISI this summer. (8/22/2019)

Is Wearable Tech Worth It? | Stats and Stories at JSM

Dr. Jane Paik Kim is Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University School of Medicine. Her professional aim is to improve public mental health through the application and development of statistical methods in mental health research. Her research interests are statistical methods for digital health interventions delivered through mobile or wearable devices, and psychiatric ethics research. Her statistical interest areas are in the robustness of regression-based inference for both clinical trials and observational studies, as well as methods development for survival data arising from non-standard biased sampling schemes. (Date: 8/9/2019)

Communicating Statistics Effectively | Stats and Stories at JSM

John Bailer is the co-creator of Stats+Stories. He is also University Distinguished Professor and chair of the Department of Statistics at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. He is currently President-elect of the International Statistical Institute and previously served on the previously on the ASA Board of Directors. His scholarly interests include the design and analysis of environmental toxicology experiments and occupational health studies, quantitative risk estimation, gerontological data analysis, promoting quantitative literacy and enhancing connections between statistics and journalism. (Date: 8/8/2019)

How Esports Stats are Tracked | Stats and Stories at JSM

Brian McDonald is currently the Director of Sports Analytics in the Stats & Information Group at ESPN. He was previously the Director of Hockey Analytics with the Florida Panthers Hockey Club, an Associate Professor in the Department of Mathematical Sciences at West Point, an AdjYoav Benjamini is the Nathan and Lily Silver Professor of Applied Statistics at the Department of statistics and Operations Research at Tel Aviv University. He is a co-developer of the widely used and cited False Discovery Rate concept and methodology. He received the Israel Prize for research in Statistics and Economics, is a member of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, and has been elected to receive the Karl Pearson Prize of ISI this summer. (7/25/2019)unct Professor in the Department of Management Science at the University of Miami, and an Adjunct Professor in Sports Analytics in the College of Business at Florida Atlantic University. He received a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from Lafayette College, Easton, PA, and a Master of Arts and a Ph.D. in Mathematics from Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD. (Date: 8/7/2019)

Using the Stats to Improve Your League of Legends Game | Stats and Stories at JSM

Michael Schuckers is the Charles A. Dana Professor of Statistics at St. Lawrence University in Canton, NY. An applied statistician he has received funding from the US National Science Foundation, the US Department of Defense and the US Department of Homeland Security. He is the author of over three dozen publications including Computational Methods for Biometric Authentication (Springer, 2010). Additionally, Schuckers has done work in sports analytics particularly ice hockey including consulting with a MLB team and an NHL team. For his work in this area, he was named a American Statistical Association's Section on Statistics in Sports "Significant Contributor". (Date: 8/6/2019)

Voter ID Stats | Stats and Stories at JSM

Kelly McConville is a survey statistician who develops estimation techniques that combine complex survey data with big data sources. Her work is used to estimate official statistics, related to canopy cover or occupational statistics, or to assess the impact of voter ID laws. She enjoys teaching her students how to learn from data and introducing them to R (an open source statistical software program). She also involves her students in her work and co-chairs two national programs: the Undergraduate Statistics Project Competition and the Electronic Undergraduate Statistics Research Conference. (Date 8/5/2019)

Making the Census Count | Stats + Stories Episode 106

Mike Ananny and Mark Hansen are both college professors who’s collaboration News Counts is trying to create a national network of journalists, news organizations, professional bodies, technology companies, schools and universities that can create a national dialog about the census, and help ensure a successful count in the 2020 Census.(Date: 8/1/2019)

How a Stats Legend Got His Start | Stats + Stories Episode 105

Yoav Benjamini is the Nathan and Lily Silver Professor of Applied Statistics at the Department of statistics and Operations Research at Tel Aviv University. He is a co-developer of the widely used and cited False Discovery Rate concept and methodology. He received the Israel Prize for research in Statistics and Economics, is a member of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, and has been elected to receive the Karl Pearson Prize of ISI this summer. (7/25/2019)

Sports Stats in 2019 | Stats + Stories Episode 104

Superbug Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 102

Dr. Scott Evans is a tenured Professor of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and the Director of the George Washington Biostatistics Center. He is the author of more than 100 peer-reviewed publications and three textbooks on clinical trials. His other positions include the Director of the Statistical and Data Management Center (SDMC) for the Antibacterial Resistance Leadership Group (ARLG) as well as the Editor-in-Chief of CHANCE and Statistical Communications in Infectious Diseases (SCID) magazines. (Date: 6/28/19 | 7/18/2019)

How Well Can You Study the Brain | Stats + Stories Episode 103

Nicole Lazar is Professor of Statistics at the University of Georgia. After receiving her BA in Statistics and Psychology from Tel Aviv University, she served three years as Statistics Officer in the Israel Defense Forces Department of Behavioral Sciences. She then moved to the US for graduate school, obtaining her MS in Statistics from Stanford University and Ph.D. in Statistics from The University of Chicago. She was Associate Professor of Statistics at Carnegie Mellon University before joining the Department of Statistics, University of Georgia. (Date: 7/11/2019)

How Do You Measure Frailty | Stats + Stories Episode 101

Karen Bandeen-Roche, PhD is a statistician / gerontologist who currently chairs the Department of Biostatistics at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Her statistical specialty areas of research are in latent variable and multivariate outcome modeling. Her gerontologic research aims to better understand the causes and course of physical disability, cognitive decline, and frailty in older adults, so that their adverse implications can be delayed or avoided. She is an ASA Fellow and a Marvin Zelen Leadership in Statistical Science Award winner. (Date: 6/20/2019)

The History of Stats + Stories | Stats + Stories Episode 100

We have reached episode 100 of Stats + Stories and therefore we felt like it would be a good time to have John Bailer, Richard Campbell and Rosemary Pennington sit around and talk about what all has brought us here and what more to expect in the future. (6/13/2019)

Statistical Mapping | Stats + Stories Episode 99

Dr. Caitlin Kontgis is a technical lead on the Applied Science team at Descartes Labs and was honored at the New Mexico Tech Council’s Women in Tech celebration in March 2018. Since moving to Santa Fe, Caitlin began volunteering at the local Girls Inc chapter and joined the board in fall of 2017. She is passionate about supporting women in STEM fields and scientific literacy. When not at work, you can find Caitlin running, skiing, and hiking the Sangre de Cristo Mountains (6/6/2019)

What's So Great About Being A Statistician | Stats + Stories Episode 98

Dr. Alicia Carriquiry is a Distinguished Professor of Liberal Arts and Sciences and a Professor of Statistics at Iowa State University. She serves as Director and lead investigator for the Center for Statistics and Applications in Forensic Evidence. The NIST Center of Excellence’s mission is to increase the scientific rigor of forensic science through improved statistical applications. Dr. Carriquiry provides scientific oversight and research expertise to the center. She participates in the Organization of Scientific Area Committees subcommittee on Materials and Trace Evidence and serves as a technical advisor for the Association of Firearms and Tool Mark Examiners. (Date: 5/30/2019)

Science Friction | Stats + Stories Episode 97

Richard Harris has covered science, medicine and the environment for National Public Radio since 1986. He has traveled the world, from the South Pole and the Great Barrier Reef to the Arctic Ocean, reporting on climate change. The American Geophysical Union honored him with a Presidential Citation for Science and Society. In 2014, he turned his attention back to biomedical research and came to realize how the field was suffering. Too many scientists were chasing too little funding. That led him to take a year-long sabbatical at Arizona State University’s Consortium for Science, Policy & Outcomes to research and write Rigor Mortis. (Date: 5/23/2019)

Social Media, Data, and Democracy | Stats + Stories Episode 96

Dr. Steven Lloyd Wilson is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Nevada, Reno. He earned his Ph.D. in political science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2016, and serves as the Project Manager of Computational Infrastructure for the Varieties of Democracy Institute at the University of Gothenburg. His research focuses on comparative democratization, cyber-security, and the effect of the Internet on authoritarian regimes. He also works on a variety of projects involving network and content analysis of social media around the world. (Date: 5/16/2019)

Reducing Conflict | Stats + Stories Episode 95

Dr. Sara Cobb has a Ph.D. in Communication (UMASS Amherst) and is the Drucie French Cumbie Chair at the School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution (S-CAR) at George Mason University, where she was, from 2001-2009, the dean/director. In her current role as faculty she teaches and conducts research on the relationship between narrative and conflict. She is also the Director of the Center for the Study of Narrative and Conflict Resolution at S-CAR, which provides a hub for scholarship on narrative approaches to conflict analysis and resolution. She is co-editor of the journal Narrative and Conflict: Explorations in Theory and Practice. (Date: 5/9/2019)

The Stats Behind Aging | Stats + Stories Episode 94

Karen Bandeen-Roche, PhD is a statistician / gerontologist who currently chairs the Department of Biostatistics at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Her statistical specialty areas of research are in latent variable and multivariate outcome modeling. Her gerontologic research aims to better understand the causes and course of physical disability, cognitive decline, and frailty in older adults, so that their adverse implications can be delayed or avoided. She is an ASA Fellow and a Marvin Zelen Leadership in Statistical Science Award winner, and she has contributed extensive service to promote the statistical profession through leadership in scientific review panels and our professional societies. (Date: 5/2/2019)

Reevaluating P Values | Stats + Stories Episode 93

Nicole Lazar is Professor of Statistics at the University of Georgia. After receiving her BA in Statistics and Psychology from Tel Aviv University, she served three years as Statistics Officer in the Israel Defense Forces Department of Behavioral Sciences. She then moved to the US for graduate school, obtaining her MS in Statistics from Stanford University and Ph.D. in Statistics from The University of Chicago. She was Associate Professor of Statistics at Carnegie Mellon University before joining the Department of Statistics, University of Georgia. (Date: 4/25/2019)

How Autocrats Use Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 92

Arturas Rozenas is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Politics at New York University. He was a National Fellow at Hoover Institution, Stanford. His research focuses on building theoretical models of authoritarian politics and testing them using natural experiments, field experiments, and machine learning tools. At NYU, he teaches courses on comparative politics and advanced statistical methods. (Date: 4/18/2019)

Making Forensic Science Scientific | Stats + Stories Episode 91

Dr. Alicia Carriquiry is a Distinguished Professor of Liberal Arts and Sciences and a Professor of Statistics at Iowa State University. She serves as Director and lead investigator for the Center for Statistics and Applications in Forensic Evidence. The NIST Center of Excellence’s mission is to increase the scientific rigor of forensic science through improved statistical applications. Dr. Carriquiry provides scientific oversight and research expertise to the center. She participates in the Organization of Scientific Area Committees subcommittee on Materials and Trace Evidence and serves as a technical advisor for the Association of Firearms and Tool Mark Examiners. (Date: 4/11/2019)

So What is RT Exactly? | Stats + Stories Episode 90

Megan Metzger is a Research Scholar and Associate Director for Research at the Global Digital Policy Incubator (GDPi) Program at Stanford University. Before coming to Stanford, she completed a PhD in Politics at NYU as a member of the Social Media and Political Participation Lab and was a Postdoctoral scholar in Russian Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Megan’s research is focused on how changes in technology change how individuals and states use and have access to information, and how this affects political behavior. Her current research is primarily focused on the role of RT as a component of Russian state strategies online. (Date: 4/4/2019)

Understanding Conflict Resolution | Stats + Stories Episode 89

Dr. Sara Cobb has a Ph.D. in Communication (UMASS Amherst) and is the Drucie French Cumbie Chair at the School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution (S-CAR) at George Mason University, where she was, from 2001-2009, the dean/director. In her current role as faculty she teaches and conducts research on the relationship between narrative and conflict. She is also the Director of the Center for the Study of Narrative and Conflict Resolution at S-CAR, which provides a hub for scholarship on narrative approaches to conflict analysis and resolution. She is co-editor of the journal Narrative and Conflict: Explorations in Theory and Practice. (Date: 3/28/2019)

How to Identify Russian Bots | Stats + Stories Episode 88

Joshua A. Tucker is Professor of Politics, affiliated Professor of Russian and Slavic Studies, and affiliated Professor of Data Science at New York University. He is the Director of NYU’s Jordan Center for Advanced Study of Russia, a co-Director of the NYU Social Media and Political Participation (SMaPP) laboratory, and a co-author/editor of the award-winning politics and policy blog The Monkey Cage at The Washington Post. He serves on the advisory board of the American National Election Study, the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems, and numerous academic journals, and was the co-founder and co-editor of the Journal of Experimental Political Science. (Date: 3/21/2019)

Making Statistics Reporting Impactful and Interesting | Stats + Stories Episode 87

Liberty Vittert is currently a Visiting Assistant Professor at Washington University in St. Louis and on leave from her position at the University of Glasgow as the Mitchell Lecturer. Her current statistical research involves using facial shape analysis to help children with facial deformities. Liberty is a regular TV and Radio contributor to many news organizations including BBC, ITV, Channel 4, PBS, and FNC, as well as having her own TV series on STV (ITV). (Date: 3/14/2019)

The U.N. and Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 86

Stefan Schweinfest was appointed Director of the Statistics Division (UNSD/DESA) in July 2014. Under his leadership, the Division compiles and disseminates global statistical information, develops standards and norms for statistical activities including the integration of geospatial, statistical and other information, and supports countries' efforts to strengthen their national statistical and geospatial systems. (Date: 3/7/2019)

Tracking Health Over Time | Stats + Stories Episode 85

Dr. Lloyd Edwards is Professor and Chair of Biostatistics at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Dr. Edwards has an extensive background in collaborating with researchers in a broad range of areas in biomedical research, including cardiovascular disease, cystic fibrosis, cancer, aging, pediatrics, and minority health. His primary area of applied statistical research relates to the analysis of longitudinal data. (Date: 2/28/2019)

Multiple Systems Estimations Explained | Stats + Stories Episode 84

Megan Price is the executive director of the Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG), and designs strategies and methods for statistical analysis of human rights data for projects in a variety of locations including Guatemala, Colombia, and Syria. She has contributed analyses submitted as evidence in two court cases in Guatemala and has served as the lead statistician and author on three UN reports documenting deaths in Syria. (Date: 2/21/2019)

Mapping Out Disease | Stats + Stories Episode 83

Lance A. Waller, Ph.D. is Rollins Professor and former Chair of the Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics, Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University. He is a member of the National Academy of Science Board on Mathematical Sciences and Analytics and has served on National Academies Committees on applied and theoretical statistics, cancer near nuclear facilities, geographic assessments of exposures to Agent Orange, and standoff explosive technologies. (Date: 2/14/2019)

How To Become a Data Scientist | Stats + Stories Episode 82

Julia Silge is a data scientist at Stack Overflow, with a PhD in astrophysics and an abiding love for Jane Austen. She is both an international speaker and a real-world practitioner focusing on data analysis and machine learning practice. She is the author of Text Mining with R, with her coauthor David Robinson. She loves making beautiful charts and communicating about technical topics with diverse audiences. (Date: 2/7/2019)

Getting Health and Science Reporting Right | Stats + Stories Episode 81

Christie Aschwanden is the author of GOOD TO GO: What the Athlete in All of Us Can Learn from the Strange Science of Recovery and the lead science writer at FiveThirtyEight. Her new podcast, Emerging Form  launches in mid-February. Find her on Twitter @CragCrest. (Date: 1/30/2019)

The Best Way to Rank Everyone | Stats + Stories Episode 80

Mark Glickman, a Fellow of the American Statistical Association, is Senior Lecturer on Statistics at Harvard University, and Senior Statistician at the Center for Healthcare Organization and Implementation Research, a VA Center of Innovation.  He is well-known for his work in games and sports, having created the Glicko and Glicko-2 rating systems that are widely used in online gaming.  (Date: 1/24/2019)

Analyzing Art Through Text Mining | Stats + Stories Episode 79

Julia Silge is a data scientist at Stack Overflow, with a PhD in astrophysics and an abiding love for Jane Austen. She is both an international speaker and a real-world practitioner focusing on data analysis and machine learning practice. She is the author of Text Mining with R, with her coauthor David Robinson. She loves making beautiful charts and communicating about technical topics with diverse audiences. (Date: 1/17/2019)

How to Teach an Intro to Stats Class | Stats + Stories Episode 78

Mark Hansen is a professor of journalism where he also serves as the Director of the David and Helen Gurley Brown Institute for Media Innovation. Founded in 2012, the Brown Institute is a bi-coastal collaboration between Columbia Journalism School and the School of Engineering at Stanford University -- its mission is to explore the interplay between technology and story. (1/10/2019)

What’s Going on With This Graph? | Stats + Stories Episode 77

Sharon Hessney is a veteran K-12 math teacher and writer, moderator, and coordinator of What's Going On With this Graph? WGOWTG is a free, weekly online feature, is a partnership of the New York Times Learning Network and the American Statistical Association. (Date: 1/3/2019)

The Statistics of the Year | Stats + Stories Episode 76

David Spiegelhalter is Winton Professor for the Public Understanding of Risk in the Statistical Laboratory at the University of Cambridge, Chair of the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication, and President of the Royal Statistical Society. (Date: 12/27/2018)

Why Should You Care If A Statistical Agency is Being Reorganized? | Stats + Stories Episode 75 

Lisa LaVange and Ron Wasserstein dive deeper into the comments made by the American Statistical Association on the recent relocation efforts being made at the Economic Research Service at the USDA. Dr. Lisa LaVange is the 2018 President and Ron Wasserstein is the executive director of ASA. (Date: 12/20/2018)

Using Data to Protect Human Rights | Stats + Stories Episode 74

Megan Price is the executive director of the Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG), and designs strategies and methods for statistical analysis of human rights data for projects in a variety of locations including Guatemala, Colombia, and Syria. She has contributed analyses submitted as evidence in two court cases in Guatemala and has served as the lead statistician and author on three UN reports documenting deaths in Syria. (Date: 12/13/2018)

Better Bayes Winner Revealed | Stats and Stories Episode 73

Stephen T. Ziliak is Professor of Economics at Roosevelt University and Conjoint Professor of Business and Law at the University of Newcastle-Australia.  A major contributor to the American Statistical Association “Statement on Statistical Significance and P-values” (2016) he is probably best known for his book (with Deirdre N. McCloskey) on The Cult of Statistical Significance: How the Standard Error Costs Us Jobs, Justice, and Lives (2008), showing the damage done by a culture of mindless significance testing, the history of wrong turns, and the benefits which could be enjoyed by returning to Bayesian and Guinnessometric roots. (Date: 12/6/2018)

Bootstrapping an International Prize | Stats and Stories Episode 72

Brad Efron is Max H. Stein Professor of Humanities and Sciences and Professor of Statistics at Stanford University, and Professor of Biostatistics with the Department of Biomedical Data Science in the Stanford School of Medicine; he serves as Co-director of the undergraduate Mathematical and Computational Sciences Program administered by the Department of Statistics. He has held visiting faculty appointments at Harvard, UC Berkeley, and Imperial College, London. He has been recognized with the 2018 International Prize in Statistics. (Date: 12/4/2018)

Coal Mining and Fact Finding | Stats and Stories Episode 71

Jonny Jacobsen Paris-based journalist works as an editor with Agence France-Presse news agency. He wrote his first article for Significance magazine during a sabbatical year in England to take a Masters in Data Journalism. He is preparing a longer version of that article, incorporating documents discussed in this week's podcast, for the Shorthand platform. DMs open on Twitter: @jonnymcj. (Date: 11/15/2018)

Understanding Data in the Digital Age | Stats and Stories Episode 70

Mark Hansen is a professor of journalism where he also serves as the Director of the David and Helen Gurley Brown Institute for Media Innovation. Founded in 2012, the Brown Institute is a bi-coastal collaboration between Columbia Journalism School and the School of Engineering at Stanford University -- its mission is to explore the interplay between technology and story. (Date: 11/15/2018)

Voter Rolls and Big Data | Stats and Stories Episode 69

Matt Dempsey is the data editor at the Houston Chronicle. He worked on projects involving wildfires, state pensions, and the chemical industry. His passion for public records frequently leads to disclosure of data from all levels of government. His series Chemical Breakdown won the 2016 IRE Innovation award and the National Press Foundation's "Feddie" award. His work was a key part of the Chronicle's Pulitzer Prize finalist entry for Breaking News. (Date: 11/1/2018)

The Fab Formula | Stats and Stories Episode 68

Mark Glickman, a Fellow of the American Statistical Association, is Senior Lecturer on Statistics at Harvard University, and Senior Statistician at the Center for Healthcare Organization and Implementation Research, a VA Center of Innovation.  He is well-known for his work in games and sports, having created the Glicko and Glicko-2 rating systems that are widely used in online gaming.  (Date: 10/18/2018)

Radio Ratings Revealed | Stats and Stories Episode 67

Tripp Eldridge is a host and member of the Cincinnati Public Radio station WVXU which producers his weekly show Start Hear where he plays the role of "Podcast Jockey" to introduce his audience to new national and local podcasts. (Date: 10/4/2018)

Explaining Bayes Better | Stats + Short Stories Episode 65 (Guest Kerrie Mengersen)

Kerrie Mengersen (@KerrieMengersen) is Distinguished Professor at the Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, and past-President of the International Society for Bayesian Analysis (ISBA) . Her research spans Bayesian statistics, computational statistics, environmental, genetic and health statistics. (Date: 9/6/2018)

Reading, Writing and Risk Literacy? | Stats + Stories Episode 64  (Guest: Gerd Gigerenzer)

Gerd Gigerenzer is Director of the Harding Center for Risk Literacy at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin and partner of Simply Rational - The Institute for Decisions. Gigerenzer has trained U.S. federal judges, German physicians, and top managers in decision making and understanding risks and uncertainties. (Date: 8/23/2018)

Happy Birthday to R! | Stats + Stories Episode 63  (Guest: Nick Thieme)

Nick Thieme (@FurrierTranform) is a research fellow at University of California Hastings Institute for Innovation Law and freelance writer for a variety of outlets. Currently, his work focuses on AI regulation, cybersecurity, and pharmaceutical patent trolling. (Date: 8/9/2018)

R R R R R ... Not Just For Pirates Anymore | Stats + Stories Episode 62  (Guest: Hadley Wickham)

Hadley Wickham (@hadleywickham) is Chief Scientist at RStudio, a member of the R Foundation, and Adjunct Professor at Stanford University and the University of Auckland. He builds tools (both computational and cognitive) to make data science easier, faster, and more fun. (Date: 7/27/2018)

Feeling The Earth Move | Stats + Stories Episode 61 (Guest: Kathryn Miles)

Kathyrn Miles ( @Kathryn_Miles ) is a journalist, Writer-in-residence at Green Mountain College and author of QUAKELAND: ON THE ROAD TO AMERICA'S NEXT DEVASTATING EARTHQUAKE and SUPERSTORM. (Date: 7/12/2018)

What Does the National Statistics Office Do? | Stats and Stories Episode 66 

Holding Up A Mirror To Society - A Tale Of Official Statistics In Greece | Stats + Stories Episode 60 (Guest: Andreas V. Georgiou)

Andreas V. Georgiou is an economist with specializations in Monetary Theory and Stabilization Policy and in International Trade and Finance. After working for the International Monetary Fund, he returned to Greece in 2010 to head the newly established Hellenic Statistical Authority (ELSTAT)-the successor of the National Statistical Service of Greece following the onset of the economic crisis in Greece. (Date: 6/28/2018)

G ..O.. O.. A.. A.. A.. L.. L.. L.. L.. - Celebrating The Statistics Of The Beautiful Game | Stats + Stories Episode 59 (Guest: Luke Bornn)

Luke Bornn (@LukeBornn) is currently Vice President, Strategy and Analytics for the Sacramento Kings. Prior to joining the Kings, Bornn served as Head of Analytics for A.S. Roma of the Italian Serie A Football League, where he worked closely with managers, coaches and sports scientists to measure and evaluate athletes and performance. (Date: 6/14/2018)

G-D-P, It'S Easy As 1-2-3 | Stats + Stories Episode 58 (Guest: Diane Coyle)

Diane Coyle. Diane is founder of Enlightenment Economics , and Bennett Professor of Public Policy at the University of Cambridge. She was recently appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for "services to Economics and the Public Understanding of Economics". She is also the author of the 2014 book -- GDP A Brief but Affectionate History. (Date: 6/7/2018)

Chins And Ears Are Not Information Rich - Awkwardness And Social Relationships | Stats + Stories Episode 57 (Guest: Ty Tashiro)

Ty Tashiro (@tytashiro) is an author and relationship expert. He wrote Awkward: The Science of Why We're Socially Awkward and Why That's Awesome and The Science of Happily Ever After . His work has been featured at the New York Times, Time.com, TheAtlantic.com, NPR, Sirius XM Stars radio, and VICE. (Date: 5/24/2018)

Are Communities Helped By Terraforming Food Deserts? | Stats + Stories Episode 56 (Guest: Bonnie Ghosh-Dastidar)

Bonnie Ghosh-Dastidar is a senior statistician and Director of the Statistics Advisory Center at RAND Corporation. Her current research interests center on leveraging natural experiment designs to estimate the effects of neighborhood-level 'interventions' or changes on residents' health behaviors (e.g. diet, physical activity) and outcomes (e.g. obesity). Her statistical expertise is in the areas of study design, survey methods, non-response, and analysis of longitudinal and multilevel data. (Date: 5/10/2018)

Abstract Art Or Modern Congressional Districts- Statistical Thinking To Fix Gerrymandering | Stats + Stories Episode 55 (Guest: Gary King)

Gary King (@kinggary) is the Albert J. Weatherhead III University Professor and Director of the Institute for Quantitative Social Science at Harvard University . King focuses on innovations that span the range from statistical theory to practical application. (Date: 4/26/2018)

Jaguar Corridors, Koala Conservation And Reef Health - Statistics In Celebration Of Earth Day | Stats + Stories Episode 54 (Guest: Kerrie Mengersen)

Kerrie Mengersen (@KerrieMengersen) is Distinguished Professor at the Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia, and past-President of the International Society for Bayesian Analysis (ISBA) . Her research spans Bayesian statistics, computational statistics, environmental, genetic and health statistics. (Date: 4/19/2018)

Protecting Seaside Cities From Possible Future Impacts Of Climate Change | Stats + Stories Episode 53 (Guest: Peter Guttorp)

Peter Guttorp (@pgseattle) is a Professor at the Norwegian Computing Center in Oslo, Norway, and Professor Emeritus at the University of Washington, Seattle. He is also a vice-president of the International Statistical Institute. (Date: 3/29/2018)

Hey, I'm Working On A Story And Can You Help Me With The Statistics? | Stats + Stories Episode 52 (Guest: Rebecca Goldin)

Rebecca Goldin ( @rebegol ) is a professor of mathematics George Mason University and the Director of STATS at Sense About Science USA. (Date: 3/16/2018)

Slavery In The Modern World | Stats + Stories Episode 51 (Guest: Davina Durgana)

Davina P. Durgana (@DavinaDurgana) is Assistant Professor and Senior Practitioner Faculty at SIT Graduate Institute, human rights statistician who has developed models to assess risk and vulnerability to modern slavery. (Date: 2/28/2018)

Reading The Book Of Love-What Can You Learn From Relationship Science? | Stats + Stories Episode 50 (Guest: Ty Tashiro)

Ty Tashiro (@tytashiro) is an author and relationship expert. He wrote Awkward: The Science of Why We're Socially Awkward and Why That's Awesome and The Science of Happily Ever After. (Date: 2/13/2018)

Balancing Rigor And Entertainment When Telling Stories About Data | Stats + Stories Episode 49 (Guest: Nick Thieme)

Nick Thieme (@FurrierTranform) is a research fellow at University of California Hastings Institute for Innovation Law and freelance writer for a variety of outlets. Currently, his work focuses on AI regulation, cybersecurity, and pharmaceutical patent trolling. (Date: 1/31/2018)

Were The Cancer Clusters Real? Statistical Support For Evaluating Public Policy | Stats + Stories Episode 48 (Guest: David Banks)

Playing A Risky Game | Stats + Stories Episode 46 (Guest: David Banks)

David Banks is a statistician at Duke University. He is a fellow of the American Statistical Association and the Institute of Mathematical Statistics, and a former editor of the Journal of the American Statistical Association and Statistics and Public Policy. (Date: 1/18/2018 & 12/4/2017)

Just In Time For The Holiday Shopping Season - A Story About Online Marketing | Stats + Stories Episode 47 (Guest: Glenn Platt)

Glenn Platt (@glennplatt) is the C. Michael Armstrong Professor of Network Technology & Management & Director of Interactive Media Studies at Miami Universit. He is interested in social media marketing, digital media and e-Commerc. He is also the faculty ponsor of the Esports team at Miami. (Date: 12/29/2017)

Thankful For A Bountiful Harvest - How Bountiful Was It And Who Produced It? | Stats + Stories Episode 45  (Guest: Linda Young)

Growing Surveys - Building An Agricultural Census | Stats + Stories Episode 44 (Guest: Linda Young)

Linda J. Young is Chief Mathematical Statistician and Director of Research and Development of USDA's National Agricultural Statistics Service. (Date: 11/20/17 & 11/6/2017)

Why Don't People Like My Graphs? | Stats + Stories Episode 43 (Guest: Alberto Cairo)

Visualization And Reporting Goals: Truth, Function, Beauty, Insight, Enlightenment And Morality | Stats + Stories Episode 42 (Guest: Alberto Cairo)

Alberto Cairo @albertocairo is the Knight Chair in Visual Journalism at the University of Miami. He's also director of the visualization program at UM's Center for Computational Science. (Date: 10/17/2017 & 10/2/2017)

Stats Of Cool Cats: Emotions, Mood Management And Cat Videos | Stats + Stories Episode 41 (Guest: Jessica G. Myrick)

Jessica G. Myrick (@jessmyrick) is an associate professor of media studies at the Bellisario College of Communications at Penn State University. Her research focuses on the role of emotions in shaping our responses to various types of media messages. (Date: 9/14/2017)

A Journalist Checks His Numbers | Stats + Stories Episode 40 (Guest: Alan Schwarz)

Gridiron ... Touchdown ... Field Goal ... Traumatic Brain Injury | Stats + Stories Episode 39 (Guest: Alan Schwarz)

Alan Schwarz (@alanschwarz) is a Pulitzer Prize-nominated journalist best known for his reportage of public health issues for The New York Times. His 130-article series on concussions in sports is roundly credited with exposing the seriousness of head injuries in the National Football League and all youth athletics. (Date: 9/1/2017 & 8/17/2017)

Describing And Measuring An $18 Trillion Economy | Stats + Stories Episode 38 (Guest: Brian Moyer)

Dr. Brian Moyer is director of the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. BEA, made up entirely of career civil servants, is an impartial producer of official statistics on the U.S. economy. (Date: 7/28/2018)

Epidemic Trials And Tribulations | Stats + Stories Episode 37 (Guest: Susan Ellenberg)

And The Winner Of The First International Prize Of Statistics Is... Sir David Cox | Stats + Stories Episode 36 (Guest: Susan Ellenberg)

Dr. Susan Ellenberg is Professor of Biostatistics, Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology and Informatics, Perelman School of Medicineat the University of Pennsylvania, with a secondary appointment in the Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy. (Date: 7/14/2017 & 6/30/2017)

Counting Crime | Stats + Stories Episode 35 (Guest: Jeri Mulrow)

Jeri M. Mulrow is the Acting Director for the Bureau of Justice Statistics. BJS's mission is to collect, analyze, and disseminate information on crime, criminal offenders, victims of crime, and the operation of justice systems at all levels of government. BJS is a component of the Office of Justice Programs in the Department of Justice. (Date: 6/15/2017)

Spotting Fake News | Stats + Stories Episode 34 (Guest: Mona Chalabi)

Sifting Through Noisy Data To Find Stories | Stats + Stories Episode 33 (Guest: Mona Chalabi)

Mona Chalabi (@MonaChalabi) is the Data Editor of The Guardian US and a columnist at New York Magazine. As well as co-producing a four-part documentary series about vaginas , Mona has written for TV shows on National Geographic, the BBC and VICE. (Date: 5/31/2017 & 5/19/2017)

Complete And Accurate Counts: Planning And Conducting The Decennial Census | Stats + Stories Episode 32 (Guest: John Thompson)

Getting The Sense Of Us From The Census | Stats + Stories Episode 31 (Guest: John Thompson)

John H. Thompson is the 24th Census Bureau Director. The Census Bureau prepares the 2020 Census and over more than 100 other censuses and surveys, which measure America's people, places and economy, and provide the basis for crucial economic indicators such as the unemployment rate. (Date: 5/17/2017 & 5/1/2017)

Do's And Don'ts Of Data Journalism | Stats + Stories Episode 30 (Guest: Andrew Flowers)

So A 70-30 Support Split Is Not A Sure Thing? | Stats + Stories Episode 29 (Guest: Andrew Flowers )

Andrew Flowers (@andrewflowers) is a freelance data journalist and a former quantitative editor at FiveThirtyEight.com . He writes about economics, trade, welfare, sports and more. (Date: 4/17/2017 & 3/31/2017)

If Your Friend Believes It, Then It Must Be True - Tracking The Spread Of Fake News Across Networks | Stats + Stories Episode 28 (Guest: Filippo Menczer)

Filippo Menczer is a professor of informatics and computer science at Indiana University, Bloomington. He is an ACM Distinguished Scientist and a Senior Research Fellow of The Kinsey Institute. (Date: 3/15/2017)

I'd Give That Study 4 Stars: Considering The Quality Of Research | Stats + Stories Episode 27 (Guest: David Spiegelhalter)

Sex By Numbers | Stats + Stories Episode 26 (Guest: David Spiegelhalter)

David Spiegelhalter is Winton Professor for the Public Understanding of Risk in the Statistical Laboratory at the University of Cambridge, Chair of the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication, and President of the Royal Statistical Society. (Date: 2/28/2107 & 2/13/2017)

What Skills Are Needed To Work In Enrollment Offices In Higher Education? | Stats + Stories Episode 25 (Guest: Michael Kabbaz)

Reading, Writing, And Enrollment Analytics | Stats + Stories Episode 24 (Guest: Michael Kabbaz)

Michael Kabbaz is Vice President , Division of Enrollment Management and Student Success at Miami University. His Division includes Offices of Admission, Bursar, Career Services, Enrollment Communication, Enrollment Operations and One Stop Services, Enrollment Research and Analysis, University Registrar,Student Financial Assistance and the Student Success Center. (Date: 2/2/2017 & 1/18/2017)

Will You Be One Of The 8% Who Keep Their New Year's Resolutions? Understanding Behavior Change. | Stats + Stories Episode 23 (Guest: Rose Marie Ward)

Dr. Rose Marie Ward is a professor in Miami University's Department of Kinesiology & Health. She studies college student health, with a focus on both addictive/harmful behaviors (alcohol use, disordered eating, unsafe and unwanted sexual behavior) and prosocial activities (women’s leadership, life satisfaction, scholastic achievement, exercise, and athleticism). (Date: 12/16/2016)

A Political Scientist Ponders| Stats + Stories Episode 22 (Guest: Bryan Marshall)

Bryan Marshall is professor of political science at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. His teaching and research focuses in the areas of Congress, congressional-executive relations, and quantitative methods. His recent book,Decision Making on the Modern Supreme Court (Cambridge University Press 2011) analyzes the process of judicial decision making. (Date: 10/20/2016)

A Winning Formula For Sports  | Stats + Stories Episode 21 (Guest: Dennis Lock)

Dennis Lock (@LockAnalytics) currently serves as Director of Analytics for the Miami Dolphins NFL team. In his role, he supports football operations through research and statistical analyses. He has been a consultant for the Iowa State University men's basketball team and is a co-author of a popular statistics textbook. (Date: 9/12/2016)

A Statistician Clears The Air | Stats + Stories Episode 20 (Guest: Barry Nussbaum)

Barry Nussbaum (@StatisticsBarry ) is former Chief Statistician at the US EPA, and is president-elect of the American Statistical Association. Included among his many accomplishments at the EPA was providing leadership to the agency effort to remove lead from gasoline (Date: 7/22/2016)

Moving Beyond The 'Just So' When Reporting Science | Stats + Stories Episode 19 (Guest: Regina Nuzzo)

Regina Nuzzo (@ReginaNuzzo) is a science writer and professor of statistics at Gallaudet University. Her writings on science, medicine, health, statistics, and the scientific research process have been published in a variety of outlets, including Scientific American, Nature, ESPN, Science News, Reader's Digest, New Scientist, and the Los Angeles Times. (Date: 6/8/2016)

Sports Reporting In The Digital Era | Stats + Stories Episode 18 (Guest: Terence Moore)

Terence Moore (@TMooreSports) is a national sports columnist and commentator who is a regular television contributor to CNN, ESPN "Outside the Lines and MSNBC. He also is a columnist for SportsonEarth.com, MLB.com and CNN.com. In addition, he does television work for the NFL Network, and he appears every Sunday night on a locally top-rated show in Atlanta.  (Date: 4/26/16)

A New Equation For Modern Journalism | Stats + Stories Episode 17 (Guest: Trevor Butterworth)

Trevor Butterworth is Director of Sense About Science USA, which advocates for evidence and transparency in science and technology in the public interest. He is also editor of STATS.org, a collaboration between the American Statistical Association and Sense About Science USA that promotes statistical literacy in the news media. (Date: 2/9/2016)

The Rule Of Numbers And The Role Of The Press: What Should The Journalist Do In The Age Of Big Data? | Stats + Stories Episode 16 (Guest: Trevor Butterworth)

Trevor Butterworth is Director of Sense About Science USA, which advocates for evidence and transparency in science and technology in the public interest. He is also editor of STATS.org, a collaboration between the American Statistical Association and Sense About Science USA that promotes statistical literacy in the news media. (Date: 12/14/2015)

Screening And Intervention For Substance Abuse | Stats + Stories Episode 15 (Guest: Nicholas Horton)

Nicholas Horton is a Professor of Statistics at Amherst College. His methodologic research interests are in longitudinal regression models and missing data methods. His collaborative statistical work focuses on psychiatric epidemiology and substance abuse research. Nick serves as an associate editor for CHANCEand The American Statistician. (Date: 7/6/2015)

Personalizing The World | Stats + Stories Episode 14 (Guest: Paul Hunter)

Paul Hunter is managing director of Customer Knowledge at dunnhumby . Customer Knowledge is understanding what customers feel, think and do to empower dunnhumby’s clients strategies. dunnhumby works with the world’s largest retailers and brands. Paul has over 25 years in leveraging data and technology to improve marketing decisions. (Date: 4/29/2015)

Reading, Writing And Statistics? - Data Analysis And Statistical Literacy For All | Stats + Stories Episode 13 (Guest: Christine Franklin)

Christine Franklin, Lothar Tresp Honoratus Honors Professor and Undergraduate Coordinator in Statistics at the University of Georgia, joined the Stats+Stories regulars to talk about educating students to be statistically literate citizens. (Date: 2/20/2015)

Numbers As Plot Elements In Financial Reporting | Stats + Stories Episode 12 (Guest: Alex Blumberg)

Alex Blumberg is a radio and podcast producer who has launched the podcast 'Startup' - a "series about what happens when someone who knows nothing about business starts one." (Date: 1/27/2015)

ESP - Evaluating Statistics For Psychic Phenomena | Stats + Stories Episode 11 (Guest: Jessica Utts)

Jessica Utts, professor and chair of the Department of Statistics at the University of California, Irvine, and the incoming 2016 President of the American Statistical Association, joined Stats and Stories to discuss research on the possible existence of psychic abilities. (Date: 10/29/2014)

Workplace Safety | Stats + Stories Episode 10 (Guest: Chris Whittaker Sofge)

Chris Whittaker Sofge is a toxicologist who leads a team that conducts quantitative risk assessment for hazards in the workplace. She is the Chief of the Risk Evaluation Branch in the Education and Information Division at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. (Date: 9/29/2014)

Medicine Is Getting Personal... | Stats + Stories Episode 9 (Guest: Bonnie LaFleur)

Bonnie LaFleur has over fifteen years of experience in statistical and cancer research, and in teaching both physicians and degree seeking statistics/biostatistics students. (Date: 8/28/2017)

How Do I Know This Medicine Works? | Stats + Stories Episode 8 (Guest: Marie Davidian) 

Marie Davidian, William Neal Reynolds professor of statistics from North Carolina State University and past president of the American Statistical Association joined the Stats+Stories regulars to discuss studies that underlie drug development.  Marie has broad interest and expertise involving the development and application of statistical methods to challenges in health science research. (Date: 7/7/2014)

What Do Seinfeld, The Tonight Show And Stats + Stories Have In Common? | Stats + Stories Episode 7 (Guest: Rick Ludwin) 

Rick Ludwin was hired by NBC Entertainment in 1979 and made director of variety shows there in 1980. He then became vice president for specials and variety programs in 1983; senior VP for specials, variety programs and late-night in 1989; and executive VP for NBC’s late-night and prime time series in 2005. (Date: 5/29/2014)
 

Earth Day: Evaluating Environmental Impacts By The Numbers | Stats + Stories Episode 6 (Guest: Jim Oris)

Jim Oris is Associate Provost for Research, Dean of the Graduate School, andUniversity Distinguished Professor of Biology at Miami University (Ohio). Jim has spent the last 36 years exploring the effects of fossil fuels and their combustion products in freshwater and marine ecosystems. (Date: 4/22/2014)

Health, Privacy Avnd Confidentiality | Stats + Stories Episode 5 (Guest: Paul Scanlon) 

Paul Scanlon is a survey methodologist and research social scientist in the Questionnaire Design Research Laboratory at the Center for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics. (Date: 2/18/2014)

CSI - Crime Stats Investigated | Stats + Stories Episode 4 (Guest: Karen Kafadar) 

Karen Kafadar, Rudy Professor of Statistics and Physics at Indiana University, joined the  Stats+Stories regulars to discuss forensic science, the evidence used help solve crimes. (Date: 1/10/2014)

What Are The Patterns Of Aging And How This Might Inform Policy? | Stats + Stories Episode 3 (Guest: Suzanne Kunkel)

Suzanne Kunkel, Director of the Scripps Gerontology Center at Miami University, joined the Stats+Stories regulars to discuss the statistics that help us understand the patterns of aging and how this might inform policy. (Date: 11/25/2013)

What Does the Census Do During the Other Nine Years? | Stats + Stories Episode 2 (Guest: Tommy Wright)

Tommy Wright, statistician in the US Census Center for Statistical Research and Methodology, joined the Stats+Stories regulars to discuss what the US Census Bureau does and why it is important. (Date: 9/20/2013)

Baseball And Statistics | Stats + Stories Episode 1 (Guest: Jim Albert)

Jim Albert, co-author of Curveball: Baseball, Statistics and the Role of Chance in the Game , editor of the Journal of Quantitative Analysis and Sports, and professor of statistics at Bowling Green State University. (Date: 5/9/2013)