People News for December 2013

The department of statistics at Oregon State University hosted ASA President Marie Davidian October 1 to celebrate the International Year of Statistics. Davidian gave a seminar titled “The Right Treatment for the Right Patient (at the Right Time).” It was attended by close to 100 students, faculty, and the public and followed by a reception. Davidian also spoke at the Oregon State Chapter of the ASA and gave the same seminar to the Portland Chapter. The celebration brought together three ASA presidents: Peter (Tony) Lachenbruch, Davidian, and Sastry Pantula, as Lachenbruch and Pantula now live in Corvallis, Oregon.

Larry V. Hedges

Larry V. Hedges, Board of Trustees Professor at Northwestern University and senior fellow at NORC at the University of Chicago, was named the 2013–2014 Statistician of the Year by the Chicago Chapter of the American Statistical Association.

Hedges received the honor during an event at Chicago’s East Bank Club on October 24. The chapter described Hedges as a person whose research straddles many fields, “in particular those of statistics, psychology, and education policy.”

Hedges said Big Data will have profound consequences for science and industry and the future of the field of statistics may well hinge on ways in which Big Data is used in many areas of interest in a lecture prepared for the event, titled “Big Data with Big Consequences, but Who Will Benefit?”

At Northwestern, Hedges holds appointments in the departments of statistics and psychology, in the School of Education and Social Policy, and in the Institute for Policy Research. At NORC, he is also co-principal investigator for the Center for Advancing Research and Communications in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.

Hedges is an elected member of the National Academy of Education and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, American Statistical Association, American Psychological Association, and American Educational Research Association. He was nominated by President Obama to the board of directors of the National Board for Education Sciences and confirmed to that position by the U.S. Senate.

Hedges is a graduate of the University of California at San Diego, with his master’s and PhD degrees from Stanford University.