Accountability Hour Offers Section Members Support, Time for Work

At the Statistics and Data Science Education Section annual business meeting during JSM 2024, Tyler George, Jennifer Ward, Aparna Nathan, and Jonathan Wells shared how difficult it was to carve out time to finish tasks. They also agreed it would be beneficial to communicate with each other and other statisticians more often, rather than just once a year or at committee meetings. These conversations led to the creation of a community with weekly online meetings, known as Accountability Hour.

Throughout the 2024–2025 academic year, a group of statisticians met for one hour every Friday. Meetings began with brief introductions, followed by each person sharing what they planned to work on for the hour. Then, everybody would spend about 50 minutes working silently. In the end, each person shared their progress or, sometimes, the difficulties they met with their task. The hour was never a competition to see who could be the most successful, but simply space and time devoted to us and our work. Each week, around four to six people joined the meeting, but about 12 individuals attended at least one Accountability Hour.

In a feedback survey (n = 9), participants identified community building; awareness of what people were working on; and the low-stakes, supportive, and productive environment as highlights of the community. A few participants summarized their experiences with the group as follows:

• Tyler George: I enjoyed connecting with faculty outside of my institution regularly and having dedicated time when I was not working on teaching responsibilities. One conversation led to the creation of a new, easily accessible data repository (housed within a Google sheet) hosted by the ASA Section on Statistics and Data Science Education, which will make it easier to find data for classes.
• Beverly Wood: Just knowing (rather than simply suspecting) that I have colleagues who also procrastinate or avoid tedious tasks helped me to face the unpleasant grading or urgent tasks during that accountability hour.
• Jas Pannu: What I enjoyed most about accountability hour was connecting with peers from other institutions—it was a valuable networking opportunity and a safe, supportive space to share thoughts and relieve stress. Having this community working alongside me—even silently—transformed daunting tasks into something manageable and even enjoyable.
• Jennifer Ward: Our Accountability Hour is my second-favorite hour of the week; my first favorite being my exercise class with my friends. I often planned my week so that I would save certain tasks for Friday 9 a.m. (Pacific) because I knew I could focus for an hour and have a great sense of accomplishment by 10 a.m. In addition to seeing the familiar faces each week, I enjoyed our candid conversations about grading, procrastination, and the plethora of emails we all receive.
• Elaine Hembree: The best part of the weekly Accountability Hour was to network with people that I often see at conferences, but don’t see outside of that. I am somewhat of an isolated statistician in my mathematics department, and I thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to connect with fellow statistics educators to hear what they are working on, both inside and outside the classroom. Being able to work on a regular task each week was an added bonus!
• Aparna Nathan: I don’t have many colleagues who are teaching faculty, so the Accountability Hour has been a great way to bond with like-minded folks from diverse institutions across the country. It’s a chance for us to have some solidarity as we face stacks of assignments to grade and deadlines to meet—but also a source of inspiration as we hear about the innovative new pedagogical ideas and projects that other attendees are tackling.

What are academic statisticians working on? The nine feedback survey responses included mentions of 38 tasks, which were then categorized into 10 groups. Participants reported that more than 50% of their Friday hours were spent preparing for class and grading, with a wide variety of goals also reported.

The most encouraging aspect of the survey results is the demand to continue the Accountability Hour and expand it next year. If this sounds like something you want to be a part of, we will be starting again in the Fall of 2025. The exact meeting time (or times) will be scheduled based on the availability of interested individuals. Sign up using the Google form.