This is a new series featuring ASA members who share their ASA stories. Our mission is to collect authentic and meaningful accounts of member experiences. If you have a story you would like to share, email the ASA’s marketing and communications coordinator, Kim Gilliam.
I joined the American Statistical Association when I was still a graduate student working on my doctoral degree in statistics. The ASA was welcoming to new and junior members. My doctoral and postdoctoral work focused on receiver operating characteristic analysis, discriminant analysis, and predictive modeling. The ASA opened doors to many more fascinating quantitative methodologies and applications, not to mention those leading experts in the field as mentors, as well as junior researchers as mentees.
The ASA offers three ways to get involved: committees; sections; and chapters. There are several reasons why I enjoy volunteering, including paying it forward, sharing cutting-edge statistics, and building leadership skills.
I first volunteered as a member and vice chair of the Committee on Applied Statisticians. I also have had various roles within the ASA, including chair of the Statistical Partnerships Among Academe, Industry, and Government Committee; secretary and chair of the Health Policy Statistics Section; co-chair of the International Conference on Health Policy Statistics; and chair-elect of the Text Analysis Interest Group.
Moreover, I have been on the editorial board of Significance, jointly published by the Royal Statistical Society and ASA. Finally, I have always signed up as a JSM mentor.
Impact, Influence, Leadership
A proud and memorable moment was when I was elected as an ASA Fellow among a group of talented members during JSM 2012 in San Diego, California. The theme of the conference was “Statistics: Growing to Serve a Data-Dependent Society,” which has become increasingly reflective of the abundance of big data and real-world data. How statisticians and data scientists can gain valuable insights to make data-driven decisions also became ever more important.
Recently, I participated in offering some advice to our members of the Biopharmaceutical Section on becoming fellows. I wrote that, as a working statistician in the health care industry, the experience of the ASA Fellow nomination has made me realize the importance of several elements, including impact, influence, and leadership.
I feel fortunate to be part of such distinguished fellows, especially since, under ASA bylaws, the Committee on Fellows can elect up to one-third of one percent of the total association membership as fellows each year. Thus, this experience with the 2012 class of fellows was meaningful and rewarding. Many of us in that crowd are helping organizations in all sectors to make informed decisions and, in my case, pursuing cures for patients.
Editor’s Note: The views expressed here are those of Kelly H. Zou and do not necessarily represent those of her employer.
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