My ASA Story: Jana Asher, Assistant Professor and Director of Statistics Education

I joined the ASA in 1999, the first year I went to the Joint Statistical Meetings (JSM). I was about to return to graduate school after 18 months at the US Census Bureau. Because JSM was in Baltimore that year and the Census Bureau was willing to foot the bill, it seemed like a good idea to go see what it was about. Somehow, by the time JSM was over, I was the membership chair for the Caucus for Women in Statistics and had met dozens of new professional contacts while attending the evening socials and business meetings. 

I found participating in ASA activities an incredibly rewarding break from the rigors of graduate school over the next several years. I became active in the Government Statistics Section (GSS), helping to cofound the Wray Jackson Smith Scholarship with Pat Doyle and Wendy Alvey. I then ended up in the election for the 2003 GSS program chair-elect, and, surprisingly, I won! Participating on the 2004 Program Committee was so rewarding, I ended up running for and serving as the 2008 program chair for the Social Statistics Section.

Another activity I found a great deal of joy in doing was writing articles for Amstat News. The following became a reflection of my career over the years:

• “A Statistician by Chance” (2001)
• “A Statistician in Iraq” (2003)
• “A Statistician Turned Field Worker: Seven Months in Sierra Leone, Part I” (2004)
• “A Statistician at Home” (2008)

I also wrote articles about statistics and human rights, international statistics issues, and equity and justice in our field. Writing these articles connected me to people I wouldn’t have otherwise met and expanded my horizons—not only in my career, but also in my life.

For personal reasons, I took a break from my career for multiple years. When I returned to life as a statistician in 2016, the ASA was waiting for me. When I became an assistant professor at Slippery Rock University (SRU) in 2019, one of my first goals was to help the statistics students start a statistics club. We had a very active student in the department of mathematics and statistics, Rebecca Nicholson, who was managing our Statistical Consultation Center. I asked her if she would help form the club and serve as its president; she was excited to do so! 

The 20+ years of my career have been colorful and varied, but I know the ASA will be there with me no matter what comes next.

Although the process for starting a club at SRU took most of my first academic year, the ASA’s process for making that club into a student chapter was relatively painless. For our first meeting, Rebecca and the other new officers wanted me to give a talk, and so I did. It was titled “Inverse Probability and the 200-Year Journey to Team Bayesian” in honor of the “Team Bayesian” and “Team Frequentist” stickers the ASA had out during that year’s JSM. I dressed up as Thomas Bayes to give the talk. We had a good 60 people at that event, and dozens of students joined the club!

I am now in my third year at SRU and my connection to the ASA is stronger than ever. Today, I worked on finalizing the invited session selections for the ASA’s Survey Research Methods Section (Yes, I’m back on the program committee!) in between preparing classes, completing a peer review, ordering pizza for the next stat club meeting, and writing this article. The 20+ years of my career have been colorful and varied, but I know the ASA will be there with me no matter what comes next.