News

Registration is now open for the NZSA 2024 Conference, which will be held from Monday 2 to Wednesday 4 December 2024 at Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand. The NZSA 2024 Conference website is here: https://sms.wgtn.ac.nz/Events/NZSA2024/WebHome The website includes links for conference registration and abstract submissions. Presentations may be delivered as either talks or posters. Abstract submissions ...

It can be read here: https://www.stats.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/newsletter91.pdf

The NZSA Awards Committee is now accepting nominations for the Association’s awards for 2024.  The list of awards is: Campbell Award, recognising sustained contribution to the promotion and development of statistics. Jean Thompson Award, recognising excellence in the application of statistics in New Zealand industry. Littlejohn Research Award, recognising excellence in research, based on publications during the five calendar ...

The School of Mathematics and Statistics at Victoria University of Wellington is pleased to host the New Zealand Statistical Association (NZSA) 2024 Conference from Monday 2 to Wednesday 4 December 2024. The conference will be held in-person, on the Victoria University of Wellington Kelburn Campus. For more information please see the conference website.

We are pleased to announce that the 2023 NZSA Award recipients are Xun Xiao (Worsley Award), Alain Vandal (Littlejohn Award) and Neil Cox (Jean Thompson Award).

        2023 NZSA Best Student Presentations (from left to right): Bethany Macdonald, Mia Biggs (Data Science Team Manager, Harmonic Analytics), Amin Boumerdassi and Jessica Allen             The NZSA congratulates the winners of the 2023 NZSA Best Student Presentations.   Harmonic Analytics generously sponsored these prizes at the 2023 NZSA Conference.        

During the 1990s, the NZ Statistical Association had an active Survey Appraisals and Public Questions Committee (SAPQC) which accepted statistics-related public questions and provided a professional response gratis if the matter was deemed to be in the public interest. The reports produced by the SAPQC during the period 1990-1999 are now in the Turnbull Library in ...

The 73rd annual New Zealand Statistical Association (NZSA) conference will be hosted by the University of Canterbury, Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha, at their Christchurch campus from Monday 4th December to Wednesday 6th December 2023.   Registration and abstract submission is now live at https://www.stats.org.nz/nzsa2023/ Take advantage of early-bird registration which runs until September 30. We look forward to seeing you ...

The NZSA Awards Committee is now accepting nominations for the Association’s awards for 2023.  The list of awards is: Campbell Award, recognising sustained contribution to the promotion and development of statistics. Jean Thompson Award, recognising excellence in the application of statistics in New Zealand industry. Littlejohn Research Award, recognising excellence in research, based on publications during the five calendar ...

The New Zealand Statistical Association wishes to add our organization to the list of those concerned about the proposed cuts at Otago and Victoria Universities, particularly as they are following closely on the heels of significant cuts at AUT, Waikato, and Massey Universities. These cuts will substantially impact New Zealand’s capability in research and university ...

It can be read here: https://www.stats.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/newsletter88.pdf

    2022 NZSA Best Student Presentations (from left to right): Adam Bartonicek, Anna Redmond, Bradley Drayton, Emma Doolin (Data Science Team Manager, Harmonic Analytics)   The NZSA congratulates the winners of the 2022 NZSA Best Student Presentations.   Harmonic Analytics generously sponsored these prizes at the 2022 NZSA Conference.

We are pleased to annouce that the 2022 NZSA Award recipients are Matt Edwards (Worsley Award), Ting Wang (Littlejohn Award), Ian Westbrooke (Jean Thompson Award) and Len Cook (Campbell Award).

David Spiegelhalter: Micromorts and superforecasting Interview on RNZ Sunday Morning 11 December 2022. https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/sunday/audio/2018870756/david-spiegelhalter-micromorts-and-superforecasting Do speed cameras reduce the chance of death? How dangerous is flying? What’s the risk of passive smoking? Micromorts – units of risk equating to a one-in-a-million chance of death – can help answer these questions. Mathematician and statistician David Spiegelhalter has done the numbers ...

Congratulations to Ken Dodds, AgResearch, on been awarded the Jones Medal, for a lifetime achievement in pure or applied mathematics or statistics, by Royal Society Te Apārangi for his work developing and applying statistical methods for genetic data analysis that enable the use of low-cost genotyping in primary industries and ecology. https://www.royalsociety.org.nz/what-we-do/medals-and-awards/research-honours/2022-research-honours-aotearoa/2022-jones-medal/ Ken Dodds Kenneth G Dodds has ...

This article (https://www.stats.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Len_Cook_Independent_statutory_roles_and_Public_Service_Act.pdf) was published in the December 2022 https://issuu.com/ipanz.  

Eurostat is organising the European Statistics Awards Programme, with worldwide competitions in the fields of nowcasting and web intelligence. The main goal of the competition is to discover promising methodologies and data sources that could be used to improve the production of European statistics.  The first round is the European Statistics Awards for Nowcasting which ...

It can be read here: https://www.stats.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/newsletter87.pdf

The NZSA Awards Committee is accepting nominations for the Association’s awards for 2022.  The list of awards is: Campbell Award: This award recognises an individual’s sustained contribution to the promotion and development of statistics. Jean Thompson Award: This award recognizes excellence in the application of statistics in New Zealand industry. Littlejohn Research Award: This award recognizes excellence in ...

The Jean Thompson award was established in 2022 and is named after the inspirational New Zealand Statistician C. Jean Thompson. This award celebrates statistical excellence by practitioners in New Zealand industry, including business, Crown Research Institutes, government agencies and departments, media, etc. The award celebrates the insightful use of statistical thinking and practice in solving ...

The NZSA Mentoring Programme was launched in March 2022 with a webinar which was attended by over 60 NZSA members. The first cohort of the mentoring programme is running from May–Oct 2022 and involves 14 mentor/mentee pairs. Participants expressed interest in being involved by completing a short survey with pairings being communicated in April. More information about ...

We are pleased to annouce that the 2021 NZSA Awards recipients are Charlotte Jones-Todd (Worsley Award) and Russell Millar (Littlejohn Award).

Welcome to the NZ Statistical Association’s new website. Please be patient with us as we get all the content up and running.

2020 Recipient of the NZSA Campbell Award: Chris Triggs Chris has made important contributions to statistics in New Zealand, particularly with regard to research and consulting. He is an accomplished researcher with an impressive collection of published articles and books. He has served on the editorial boards of Biometrics, and the Australia, New Zealand Journal of ...

It is with sadness we share news of the passing of Sir Vaughan Jones FRS Hon FRSNZ, aged 67, from the complications from an ear infection. Sir Jones will be remembered as a brilliant mathematician who made outstanding contributions to the field of mathematics, scientific research and higher education. Sir Vaughan Jones was born and raised ...

The old ANZSTAT mail list has now been replaced by ANZSTAT discussion forum, hosted by the Statistical Society of Australia. This is a great place to connect with the statistical community, to have interesting discussions, and advise of jobs vacancies or upcoming events. You can join the forum here  https://www.statsoc.org.au/Discussion-forum. There is also a nice YouTube video with ...

A fun interview on RNZ with Adrian Barnett (Statistician, QUT) from Sunday 23 August 2020: https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/sunday/audio/2018760724/from-dna-to-rna-science-s-unhealthy-obsession-with-acronyms   Their paper is “Meta-Research: The growth of acronyms in the scientific literature” Adrian Barnett, Zoe Doubleday https://elifesciences.org/articles/60080

Alcohol: A dangerous love affair? While coping with the lockdown might have you reaching for the wine – or something stronger – George Seber would caution against that. He’s an Emeritus Professor of Statistics at Auckland University and has crunched the numbers on the harm caused by the $4b New Zealanders spend on alcohol each year. His book, ...

Acting on behalf of the NZSA, the President, Secretary and Immediate Past President sent the following email to the Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor,  the Government Statistician and the Chief Science Advisor for the Ministry of Health   Dear Professor Juliet Gerrard, Prime Minister’s Chief Science Advisor cc Mark Sowden, Government Statistician Ian Town, Chief Science Advisor, Ministry of ...

Statistical Society of Australia webinar on COVID-19 by by Nicholas Fisher and Dennis Trewin “Learning about the knowns and unknowns: The essential role of statisticians” is on the SSAI Youtube channel: https://youtu.be/naQZlpuWdbE About this webinar: Understanding and controlling the spread of COVID-19 is critically dependent on the availability of high-quality data to inform modelling and forecasting, and ...

Tom Robertson was the former Director Biometrics, Ministry Agriculture and Fisheries. He died in his 87th year. His death notice was published in Dominion Post on Dec. 30, 2019 ROBERTSON, Thomas Gilchrist: Formerly of Paraparaumu. Passed away peacefully on Saturday 28 December 2019, in his 87th year. Much loved husband of the late Elva. Loved dearly by all his ...

      Associate Prof John Harraway has taught for 54 years in the University of Otago’s mathematics and statistics department and is  a former president of the International Association for Statistical Education.  He talks to reporter John Gibb about his long career and his third and final retirement. John Harraway’s career highlights the remarkable power of statistics to ...

Another RNZ podcast, as much statistical as mathematical https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/2018712945/kit-yates-maths-a-matter-of-life-and-death For example, statistics badly applied did lead to Sally Clarke’s death. And helped wrongly convict Angela Cannings, Trupti Patel and Donna Anthony for murders of their children also.

  New Zealand-born data scientist Hadley Wickham is developing open source ways to help people collect and analyse the information that surrounds us every day. He’s yet to meet a data set he doesn’t like and loves poring over his own heart rate statistics, hospital admissions data, and obscure surveys of national eating habits. As well as revealing ...

Sir David Spiegelhalter talks for 50 minutes with Kim Hill: https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/saturday/audio/2018712277/david-spiegelhalter-the-art-of-statistics   “In his new book The Art of Statistics the Cambridge Professor shares his passion for data, scientific evidence and risk, and how it’s reported to us. So bacon kills? Well, not so much. And don’t get him started on average house prices. He also collects thousands of coincidences, trying to separate blind ...

Genetics Society of America (GSA) Grants 2019 Elizabeth W. Jones Award for Excellence in Education to Bruce Weir   Bruce Weir, PhD, of the University of Washington in Seattle is the recipient of the 2019 Genetics Society of America (GSA) Elizabeth W. Jones Award for Excellence in Education, in recognition of his work training thousands of researchers ...

  Kiwi Hadley Wickham has won a prestigious international statistics award for his outstanding contributions to the profession.             https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12254723&fbclid=IwAR2cyyunqObCFpyKSzztjg_fD3wA3Yj9vPA4WFLHXQ94_6SLNRIIzNAvg44  

Ken Russell (ex Victoria University of Wellington) passed away peacefully in Wollongong on 16 July after suffering from cancer, in his 69th year. Ken is survived by his wife Janet, and brothers Colin and Ian. His funeral will be held on Tuesday 23rd July at 2pm, at St Mark’s Anglican Church, 433 Crown Street Wollongong. In lieu of flowers ...

INVITATION TO COMMENT on draft, BY 31 MAY 2019 The International Data Science for Schools Project (IDSSP) is an international collaborative activity to develop a curriculum framework for pre-calculus introductory course in Data Science for the last two years of high school, and to develop a parallel framework to teach teachers how to teach such a ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0KfXPVBNQk