Three global initiatives to further statistical literacy

• Activity Number: 321
• Type: Invited
• Date/Time: Tuesday, August 2, 2011 : 10:30 AM to 12:20 PM
• Sponsor: International Association for Statistical Education
• Author(s): Mary Townsend*+
• Companies: Statistics Canada
• Keywords: North-South-South ; Statistical Literacy ; Jimma University ; Inter-University Program

Abstract

Introduction: Jimma University (JU) is a public university mandated to run graduate and undergraduate programs. Recently, JU has ranked first among all public and private universities in Ethiopia. Challenges: In addressing the mandates, JU has faced chronic problems in the areas of Statistics, because of insufficient professional statisticians. Opportunities: As a source of professionals, JU critically searched for statisticians working in statistics offices, research centers and other universities. The existence of an Inter-University collaborative program with Belgian universities was the second opportunity. With aim of pulling together all these opportunities, JU proposed a NSS project in Statistics, with South partners, Jimma, Hawassa, AddisAbaba, Gonder and Mekele Universities from Ethiopia and Eduardo Mondlane University, from Mozambique, and North partners, Ghent, Hasselt, Leuven Universities from Belgium. A promising start: this collaborative initiative has resulted in running a joint graduate program, in various fields of applied statistics in JU and other sister universities; and also enabled us to offer various refresher statistical trainings (www.NSSbiostat.ugent.be).