Annie Qu, 2015 JSM Program Chair

The 2015 JSM Program Committee is soliciting invited session and introductory overview lecture proposals. Of particular interest are sessions that appeal to diverse audiences and are closely related to the theme: “Statistics: Making Better Decisions.”

Invited sessions include invited papers, panels, and posters. Invited paper sessions consist of 2–6 speakers, invited panels have 3–6 panelists providing commentary on a particular topic, and invited posters have 10–12 participants with posters addressing a common theme. An invited session proposal includes a session title, general description of the session, list of participants, and tentative talk titles and abstracts.

If you are interested in organizing one of the 183 invited sessions, you should select a session topic and solicit potential speakers who are active in that area. Once you have a sufficient number of committed speakers, you can contact JSM program committee members whose sections or societies would be likely to sponsor your session. If your proposal does not fit among any of the ASA sections or societies, you can contact the general methodology chairs for invited papers or panels or the poster chair for invited posters.

The deadline for submitting invited proposals is September 4. For best results, make sure to read the rules for session participants at the website before submitting.

The program committee will post the final invited sessions, including competition sessions, by the end of September. Note that most ASA sections or societies have limited slots for invited sessions (1–4), so it is important to make your session proposal competitive with interesting topics and strong speakers. Also, to have a better chance of securing an invited session slot, you should contact program committee members as early as possible.

The committee also is soliciting proposals for introductory overview lectures, which should be closely related to the JSM 2015 theme, as well. These might address, for example, how to extract crucial information from large-scale data to make more informed and successful decisions.

The 2015 Joint Statistical Meetings will be held in Seattle, Washington. Seattle is a delightful city to visit in August, with an average daily temperature of 70F. It features many fun places to visit such as Pike Place Market, the Space Needle, and the downtown waterfront. A little farther away are the world-famous Olympic and Mount Rainier national parks. Visit the Seattle website for details.

See you in Seattle!