This series features 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 first joined the ASA in 1999, when I entered graduate school. One of my first interactions was winning the Gertrude Cox Award in 2000, which gave me a boost of confidence and facilitated attending my first JSM (Indianapolis). I shared a hotel room with three fellow graduate students and had my introduction to the wonderful ASA community; I felt like I was being welcomed into the world of statistics.
I have attended nearly every JSM since to learn about new methods and applications and connect with old friends and colleagues. As someone who now straddles several fields, going to JSM feels like going back to my roots.
My involvement with the ASA was really solidified in the late 2000s, when I become involved in the effort to start up the Mental Health Statistics Section (MHSS), which is now thriving. At the time, I was an assistant professor of mental health and trying to find my way as someone with one foot in mental health research and one foot in biostatistics. Finding a community of fellow statisticians who were also working in the field of mental health research helped me see that, yes, I could make a career as a statistician, even with a primary appointment in a non-(bio)statistics department.
The collaborative nature of that early group and its commitment to enhancing the visibility of the role of statistics in mental health research was inspiring. I helped write the charter for the section and became one of the first chairs. Becoming involved in the MHSS has given me a professional identity, as well as close friends and colleagues.
I attend at least six conferences per year (ranging from the Society for Research on Educational Effectiveness to Academy Health to the Society for Prevention Research), but ASA conferences such as JSM and the International Conference on Health Policy Statistics always feel like my professional home.
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