New Zealand Statistical Association Newsletter 68
September 2008
Campbell Award and Life Membership of NZSA - Sharleen Forbes
NZSA Campbell Award Criteria
Pickering Medal - Ross Ihaka
Campbell Award and Life Membership of NZSA - Sharleen Forbes
At
the Annual General Meeting of the NZSA Conference in Hamilton in September,
Sharleen Forbes was given life membership to the Association. Later that
evening, Sharleen was presented the NZSA Campbell Award in recognition
to her contribution to statistics.
The mother of four adult children, Sharleen has worked at Statistics New
Zealand since 1994; first as Manager Public Policy then as Chief Analyst,
General Manager Strategic and Financial Services, General Manager Statistical
& Methodological Services, and currently as General Manager Statistical
Education & Research in conjunction with an Adjunct Professorship
in Official Statistics at the School of Government, Victoria University,
Wellington. In the past she has worked as both a secondary school mathematics
teacher and university lecturer in mathematics and statistics. She has
a long-standing interest in mathematics education, in the measurement
of gender and ethnic differences in mathematics in particular, and in
the application of simple techniques to explain longitudinal data.
For a number of years Sharleen convened a small collective of women (EIME
– Equity in Mathematics Education) that carried out several research
projects and published reports such as ‘‘Mathematics for All’
(Forbes, Blithe, Clark & Robinson 1990) and “The Testing of
Girls in Mathematics” (Blithe, Clark, Forbes & Forbes 1994).
She has been a long-standing member of the International Association of
Women in Mathematics Education (IOWME), and an active committee member
of the New Zealand Statistical Association. She was elected as President
of this association from 1997-1999, and in 2001 was elected as the first
New Zealand woman member of the International Statistics Institute (ISI).
In August 2000 she graduated with a PhD (done, in the main, extramurally
from Curtin University of Technology in Perth) on the topic of “Measuring
Students’ Education Outcomes: Sex and Ethnic Differences in Mathematics”.
This led to her being asked to co-share a plenary session with Prof Gila
Hanna of Canada at the Mathematics Education into the 21st Century Conference
in Jordan in November 2000, and to be the Bevan Werry Memorial Speaker
at the New Zealand Mathematics Association onference in 2001.
Her current personal research outside the work place involves surveying
voluntary organizations that hold meeting, but not membership, registers.
She is a keen tramper and mountain trekker having climbed Tapuae O Uenuku
(New Zealand), Mt Kosciuszko (Australia), Mt Kilimanjaro (Africa) and
to the base camp of Annapurna (Nepal). She also enjoys canoeing, biking,
gardening, science fantasy and family time.
Ross Ihaka receives Pickering Medal 2008
Ross Ihaka (University of Auckland) received the Pickering Medal for 2008 at the RSNZ Awards Dinner on 11 November. This celebrates his contribution as an originator of R. Ross is pictured below (left) with Professor Chris Triggs (University of Auckland) at the Awards Dinner.
For further on this:
RSNZ Media Release
RSNZ Full Details
RSNZ Photo Gallery
U Auckland
Otago Daily Times
Yahoo
This award was initiated in 1999 to promote statistics within NZ and to recognise an individual’s contribution to the promotion and development of statistics. The first recipient was Stan Roberts. Stan will be remembered most recently for his efforts in the NZ statistics history project. The award was given to him at the conference in Wellington in 1999. The second recipient was Murray Jorgensen and the award was given to him at the conference in Christchurch in 2001. Then Harold Henderson received the third award in 2003, and Jeff Hunter the fourth award in 2006. Sharleen Forbes is the fifth recipient.
The criteria for the award are:
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publishing the best, recent, original statistical research undertaken within NZ, or,
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making an outstanding contribution to statistical education, or,
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playing a key role in consulting on a major, innovative research project that has direct relevance to NZ, or,
-
making a significant contribution to promoting statistics within NZ.
One point worth noting is that the award may only be given to fully paid up members of the NZSA. All membership categories are eligible. This could be a way of encouraging new members - promise new members that they may one day be given an award!
Applications are received twice a year (April/October)
and are invited for funding for projects in 2008/09. There is no formal
application process but please supply details of your project, the full
project budget, the amount you are requesting, a short statement about
why your project is within Professor Campbell’s interests, and your
full contact details.
Please send your applications to the Secretary, Richard
Penny, NZSA, PO Box 1731, Wellington.
For more details contact Roger
Littlejohn or Harold Henderson.
Roger Littlejohn