Michael O’Grady, former assi stant secretary
Statistics Blogs
for planning and evaluation at the Department
of Health and Human Services during the “Bush
II” Administration, presented the federal govern-
ment user perspective, indicating that government
research and statistics agencies should be “analysts,
not advocates.” That analysis, he argued, must be
relevant to the policy debate, timely, transparent,
and effectively communicated. Nancy Kingsbury
of the U.S. Government Accountability Office
described its role in producing reports for Congress,
particularly in recent years on the preparations for
the 2010 Census, with 40 reports from 2005–2009.
Joseph Salvo from the New York City Department
Statistician in Training
of City Planning provided the urban planner’s point
A statistics graduate student
of view, calling for an increase in the size of the
writes about his day
American Community Survey so local governments
http://mncube.blogspot. can make better use of this more timely data across
com/2009/03/agghhh.html their many communities.
William M. Briggs
Future Challenges and Opportunities
All manner of statistical analyses
Former Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner
cheerfully undertaken
and COSSA President Janet Norwood joined former
http://wmbriggs.com
U.S. Chief Statistician and Census Bureau Deputy
Director Hermann Habermann in looking at the
system’s future needs, challenges, and opportunities.
The Scholarly Kitchen
The key for Norwood was that the system continue
What’s hot and cooking in
to produce high-quality data, relevant to user needs
scholarly publishing
completely free from political interference. She
http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org
called the present “a pretty decent system.” It was
also important, Norwood said, to help the public
Open Content Alliance
understand the “probably” factor—the “science of
Building a digital archive of global
uncertainty” in producing data. The statistical agen-
content for universal access
cies, she said, need to expand and review their data
collections, “find new ways to do things,” and stay
www.opencontentalliance.org
connected to their counterparts in academe. She is
also quite concerned about the need to attract well-
Freakonomics
qualified people to work in the agencies.
The hidden side of everything
Habermann credited the system with a great
http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com
history of innovation, but called for the develop-
ment of private nonprofit centers on statistical
and informatics research that would help provide
Blog on LaTeX Matters
the sorely needed new innovations. Among these
Reporting without troubles
would be figuring out how to achieve more integra-
http://texblog.wordpress.com
tion among the various agencies without running
afoul of privacy and confidentiality concerns. He
The web sites listed here are provided as a courtesy. The ASA does too called for “a dialogue with the American people”
not control, monitor, or guarantee the information contained in
any other entity web sites and shall not be liable for any damages
on the data collection and uses by the government
of any kind. If you have a web site statisticians would find useful that would include more transparency and more
and you would like to see it listed, send it to
megan@amstat.org.
informative and easier-to-use web sites. In conclud-
ing, Habermann called attention to the cybersecu-
rity issues that affect all data systems. ■
12 AMSTAT NEWS JULY 2009
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84