Ni Zhao’s career as a biostatistician followed a convoluted path. When she was a kid, her parents dreamed she would become a medical doctor. She partly had the same wish—she wanted to work toward improving human health and well-being. Yet, she was also fascinated by the beauty of mathematics and didn’t think there was a way to combine math and medicine until she discovered biostatistics. Now, as an assistant professor of biostatistics at The Johns Hopkins University, she collaborates with top-notch researchers and participates in frontline research.
Celebrating Women in Statistics
Susan VanderPlas
Susan VanderPlas loved math but didn’t want to be a statistician like her father. To her, what he did looked boring, and she wanted to know how the brain worked. During her master’s project, she became interested in statistical graphics because it reminded her of her first love—psychology and how the brain works. Because she is red-green colorblind, she began investigating how perception differed from the raw data presented in charts and what people took from the visualizations. She also helped organize the 2019 Uncoast Unconference—a workshop and hackathon for R users in “flyover country.” Today, she is an assistant professor in statistics at the University of Nebraska and involved in the ASA Section on Statistical Graphics.
Snehalata Huzurbazar
Snehalata Huzurbazar’s family is entrenched in the mathematical and physical sciences, so she tried to avoid anything close to STEM. It wasn’t until the economist Kathy Anderson told her a degree in statistics would be useful for employment that she discovered she passionately enjoyed the discipline and eventually earned a PhD in the field. Though the bulk of her career is as a faculty member in statistics departments, her proudest achievement occurred when, after some campus sexual assault incidents, she initiated and obtained funding to create the Combat Violence Against Women program. This created the University of Wyoming’s STOP Violence Program, which has since been institutionalized.
Alyssa Frazee
Alyssa Frazee became interested in statistics during her AP Statistics class in high school, because stats, she discovered, was the tool that helped us cope with uncertainty. Eventually, she earned her PhD in biostatistics and fell in love with programming. She has since dabbled in security, political forecasting, and fraud prevention, but is now a software engineer when she isn’t doing improv or playing the piano.
Celebrating Women in Statistics and Data Science 2022
In honor of Women’s History Month, we are once again celebrating ASA women who work in statistics and data science. These accomplished women were chosen because they are leaders, mentors, and influencers. Read their stories to find out why they chose statistics, who influenced them, and what they have accomplished.
Nell Sedransk
The ink was barely dry on Nell Sedransk’s PhD when she joined the department of surgery at the University of Wisconsin and assembled a clinical trials statistical center for cancer research. Spending time at the radiologist’s elbow, she learned the boundaries of a lung tumor are not sharp and distinct, exact repetition of an X-Ray is technically not possible, and the best in the world cannot measure without error. Later, she took research leadership appointments at the National Institute of Science and Technology (NIST) and National Institute of Statistical Sciences (NISS). At NIST, she became part of the multidisciplinary team overseeing modeling to determine the cause and process of the World Trade Center collapse. At NISS, she focused on research, mentoring, and program building. She has always wanted to keep learning; being a statistician has fulfilled that wish.
Amal Moussa
Born and raised in Lebanon, Amal Moussa holds a PhD in statistics, earned with distinction from Columbia University. Her thesis, “Contagion and Systemic Risk in Financial Networks,” shed light on the importance of the network structure in identifying systemic financial institutions and formulating regulatory policies and has been cited as a reference by former Federal Reserve president Janet Yellen. Moussa was also awarded the Minghui Yu Teaching Award at Columbia University.
Anna B. Nevius
When Anna Nevius took a statistics course her senior year in college, she knew it was the field she wanted to study. After earning her PhD in applied statistics from the University of Maryland, she landed a job at the US Food and Drug Administration Center for Veterinary Medicine in their biostatistics group. Having found her dream job, she spent the rest of her career there designing studies and improving the ways data is gathered for animals who cannot verbally respond. She has since retired but continues to mentor colleagues as a member of the ASA and Caucus for Women in Statistics. She also served on the ASA Board of Directors as Council of Sections representative in addition to serving as chair of the Biopharmaceutical Section.
Andrea Rau
Andrea Rau has always loved learning. When her grandfather introduced her to BASIC on his Apple IIC, she fell in love with coding, particularly because it called for both logical and creative thinking. During college, she worked with data from the National Bone Marrow Donor Program and found it so rewarding she filled the remainder of her bachelor’s degree with statistics courses, eventually earning her master’s and PhD in applied statistics. Rau accepted a permanent researcher position near Paris at the French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food, and the Environment after graduating and made France her permanent home. There, she enjoys being at the interface of statistics and biology, working with R packages, and mentoring students.
Holly Shulman
What appealed to Holly Shulman most about statistics was how it applied a mathematical approach to real-world problems. Consequently, her greatest passion has been developing the Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS), a state-population-based surveillance system of maternal behaviors and attitudes before, during, and shortly after pregnancy. PRAMS data has led to improved health through programmatic and legislative efforts. Shulman also serves as co-lead of the Healthy People 2030 Maternal, Infant, and Child Health (MICH) workgroup. Valuing professional service, Shulman served as president of the Caucus for Women in Statistics in 1999 and was chair of the ASA Committee on Women in Statistics in 2000. She is motivated by and follows in the footsteps of many inspiring women before her and hopes to inspire those who come after her.