This is a session of Topic 6: Statistics education, training and the workplace
(Friday 16th, 11:00-12:30)
Statistical applications in the workplace
Organizer
- Joseph Wisenbaker (United States)
Abstract
Previous ICOTS meetings have featured a variety of sessions under this general topic. Most recently, ICOTS 7 included contributions examining the training of statisticians in the contexts of engineering, medicine, and environmental science among others. ICOTS 6 touched on additional contexts including aspects of statistical training for those in law, politics, business, government, and institutional research. These domains provide rich and fruitful settings that inform those of us intimately involved in training professionals whose primary interests lie outside the narrower confines of statistics.Evaluation is itself a very active field that spans these and other contexts in which researchers have the need for training in statistics in particular and research methods in general. Entire journals such as the American Journal of Evaluation, the Canadian Journal of Program Evaluation, Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, Evaluation and the Health Professions, and Evaluation and Program Planning exist to promote best practices among those engaged in evaluation research.
While broad areas of common need exist in terms of statistical training for preparing professionals to conduct evaluation research, different fields often require somewhat different emphases beyond the most basic sets of statistical skills. Likewise, conducting evaluation research carries with it a host of extra-statistical demands in relation to identifying critical context, input, process and product variables that need be considered. In addition, evaluation research demands a degree of professional collaboration and awareness of how evaluation may influence decision making that place demands on practitioners that are somewhat different from those affecting more “academic” researchers.
In this session we will hear from speakers who have had a wealth of experience touching on evaluation research in diverse fields including education, medicine and public policy. They will have much to offer in terms of their perspective on statistical and extra-statistical training required for preparing professionals in this challenging area.
Papers
| Paper | Title | Presenter(s) / Author(s) |
| 6E1 | Training and conducting economic evaluation in public health | Phaedra Corso (United States) |
| 6E2 | Issues in training physicians in the uses of statistics: what do they think they need to know? | Jennifer Freeman (United Kingdom) Jim Crossley (United Kingdom) Fergus Hamilton (United Kingdom) Claire Kok Shun (United Kingdom) Molebedi Segwagwe (United Kingdom) Philip Sedgwick (United Kingdom) |
| 6E3 | Helping make government policy analysts statistically literate | Sharleen Forbes (New Zealand) Paul Bucknall (New Zealand) Nathaniel Pihama (New Zealand) |