International Biometric Society Education Committee (Educ Cttee)
Minutes of meeting on 11 July 2016
Present:
Pascale Tubert , Jane Hutton, Yehenew Getachew, Kazue, Taesung Park, Annette Kopp-Schneider
Joel Greenhouse, Krista Fisher, Elizabeth Thomson
Dee Ann Walker
Apologies: Jim Todd, Timothy E. O'Brien, Jaakko Nevalainen
Achievements:
Short Courses
Krista noted that there was a good range of courses, not only clinical trial topics. Three courses had over 30 people attending and one had 16. Two short courses were cancelled in Florence, as fewer than 10 people signed up.
One short course would be recorded. There was discussion of:
which short courses to record for future viewing from IBS website, (the short courses were selected by previous committee);
how to decided whether to continue recording;
whether to record more than one short course.
About two hundred people watched (or ran) the video-recordings. These viewings might be shown to a class, so the number of people watching might be rather higher. John Hinde and Krista Fisher have used the video-recordings in teaching.
Professionals work with speakers to correct before it goes on the website. There are expenses involved in production. The recordings are on the members section of the website, so that members can use the recordings as a member benefit. We need to work to improve the uptake of this benefit.
Statistics in Practice:
Purpose of Statistics in Practice (SiP) is to provide a more general educational session, with examples of good practice, particularly for younger people.
Suggested topics and potential organisers for Statistics in Practice forBarcelona were:
Age - cohort - period models in epidemiology - Bendix Carstenson;
Survey sampling;
Agriculture or envirnoment - Andrew Mead;
Missing data - Ian White, Shaun Seamus;
Introduce the software package for something.… (but this is done in short courses.)
The topic should come from Educ Cttee, and be selected to be as effective as possible.
Action: all to consider speakers, and which topics.
Sponsorship:
For short courses, the allowed maximum expenses for a full day course are $1500, max $3000, though the intention is that short courses at least break even.
Similar expenses, up to $1500 for the half were offered for SiP, from Wiley sponsorship. Speakers decide how to split the money, and one SIP speaker declined to claim expenses. Fees are paid by participants for short courses, but not for SiP. James Carpenter would like Educ Cttee to find sponsorship for SiP. For the future, any payment will come from the Education Committtee budget.
Educ Cttee to ask for sponsorship. DeeAnne’s approach was to call Wiley, and give examples of types of sponsorship. For $5000, X could be named as sponsor and the sponsor's logo be on the website when the video-recording is uploaded. We hope sponsoring education is more popular than sponsoring coffee.
Action: Educ Cttee co-operate with DeeAnne (or her sucessor) on this. All
Financial Support: Educ Cttee decides on provision of financial support. In the previous year
Regional support provided in the last year went to Uganda, Argentina, Capadocia. (Question after cttee meeting: have we received reports on the events?)
There will be several regional conferences in 2017. The office should let people know what sponsorship they can request, and how to make a request - there is a format.
Action: Educ Cttee Chair to check with DeeAnne or her sucessor that this is in hand.
Action: Educ Cttee (who?) to write to regions to gently encourage them to plan in advance. (again, Action: Educ Cttee (who?) to write for the IBS bulletin.
Courses for developing countries:
Individuals have contributed to preparing and presenting courses for developing countries, with little as yet done as Educ Cttee.
Tim O'Brien is giving courses in Biometry in Thailand, Laos, Cambodia this year. Last year, he gave courses on applied statistics in R in Nepal, Vietnam. This included academics who teach mathematicians and are strong in theoretical mathematics, but had never met a dataset. Scientists who need to learn more statistical analysis also attended, and young students.
Jane Hutton has taught at three of the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS) centres. The Royal Statistical Society has signed a memorandum of agreement with AIMS-Tanzania. Travel costs for two lecturers and a teaching assistant will be paid by the RSS each year, and Jane Hutton is the current RSS liaison contact.
Yehewe described an M.Sc in biostatistics in Ethopia, run jointly with Hasselt University. They are developing a PhD programme.
Krista Fisher offered an epidemiology course.
Opportunties in China, Japan, India, Singapore, and South Korea were discussed. China, India, and South Korea have regular bi-ennial conference.
The Australiasian region has lots of money. Invite colleagues from Vietnam to CISK conference in India 2016. It would be good to work towards a South East Asia regional network, perhaps with a regular programme of one or two short courses, followed by talks from participants. There might be a nucleus of people to start things at Cheng Ma in Thialand; Tim O'Brien has connections.
Goodwill brings people together; we need to be aware of sensitivities of other colleagues and institutions who also contribute in this arena.
Action: Jane and Tim to write paragraphs to go with a discussion piece in the Bulletin
Action: Joel will discuss the RSS approach with the Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies (COPSS, North America) andsee whether further funding can be provided.
Action: Educ Cttee to ask others to let us know what they are doing.
Journal club:
Jaakko from Finland offered to start this, and Jim Todd has also offered help.
It might be sensible to start with Jim Todd working collaboration with the Nordic-Baltic region (Krista, Jaakko), learn from the first sessions, and then develop. Krista suggested linking with Uganda, Tanzania and Ethiopia. The papers for discussion would be taken from JABES, Biometrics and similar journals. Perhaps the award winning papers at IBC 2016 should be the first papers. If possible, the authors would be part of the discussion. A short (you-tube) videos of papers would give an over-view, to make papers more accessible. We need to decide whether over-view videos will be open access or a member benefit.
Philip Rice (ENAR) could make some ENAR-webinars available through IBS, but those require charges. Details to be worked out.
Next meeting: Conference call in September, with agenda in advance. This is before budget setting in October.
Communication c'ttee: Each c'ttee should contribute something. Prepare for this in Sept.