HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Sun, 12 Apr 1992 14:36:21 CDT
Reply-To:     Larry Ries <C459006@UMCVMB.BITNET>
From:         Larry Ries <C459006@UMCVMB.BITNET>
Subject:      Abbreviation

     Let me preface my remarks by saying that I DO NOT mean to insult
anyone, and I am NOT trying to be critical of anyone on this list.

     I am a Ph.d. student in statistics at the University of Missouri, and
I have been involved in teaching students in elementary classes here since
my undergrad days.  I have noticed that virtually everyone in the
Statistics Department here refers to our dicipline as "Stat" if an
abbreviation is needed.  I have never heard a true statistician refer to
the subject as "Stats."  For example, "I majored in stat; I am taking a
stat course."

     Curiously, most students in elementary classes refer to the course as
"Stats."  ("I flunked the stats test.  I hate stats.")

     I have noticed some folks on this list serve using the "stats"
abbreviated form.  I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it, just
that it seems strange th, in my experience most people in the field
call it "stat" while those outside call it "stats."

     Similarly, I always call mathematics "math," but my Sri Lankan
friends call it "maths."  (I think this is common in Eastern Countries.)

     Any comments?
     Larry Ries
     Dept. of Statistics
     University of Missouri
     Columbia, MO
From: mff@UKC.AC.UK
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Subject: Women in Statistics: Florence Nightingale
Date: 12 Apr 92 15:42:15 GMT
Reply-To: mff@UKC.AC.UK
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU
Via:      UK.AC.UKC; 12 APR 92 16:42:53 BST
X-To:         BIOM030@unlvm.unl.edu, EDSTAT-L@ncsuvm.BITNET, MW12@liv.ac.uk

As more than one person mailed me for a more complete reference to F.N. than I
could muster off the top of my head, I thought it worth posting to the EDSTAT-L
group as a whole.

It is "Florence Nightingale" by I Bernard Cohen, pp 98-107, Scientific American,
March 1984.

My "few years ago" was an underestimate - doesn't time fly! Try to get the
original rather than a photocopy, as the colours of F.N.'s graphics do not
copy well.

Mike Fuller
University of Kent at Canterbury, U.K. (email mff@ukc.ac.uk)
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Wed, 8 Apr 1992 15:53:23 CST
Reply-To:     April Milliken-Janne <BIOM030@UNLVM.BITNET>
From:         April Milliken-Janne <BIOM030@UNLVM.BITNET>
Subject:      OVERALL F TEST

This is rather basic, but not for my clients...maybe you can help me find
a good explanation.  I don't often run across a case where the overall F
value from ANOVA is non-significant, but recently it has occurred quite
often.  The basic question is this:  If the overall F test gives a very
large p-value, can one have any faith in the analysis?  In other words,
if factor A is significant, but the overall F test is non-significant,
should I believe that A is really significant?  To avoid confusion, the
degree of non-significance to which I refer is 0.5 or greater.

I do not think this issue has ever been discussed fully in my course work,
or in the classes for students such as my client.  How should it be taught?

My client seemed to be very upset about it...though I didn't understand his
reasoning;  all he wanted from a statistician was low p-values.  So, I now
ask you to help me out here.  In what terms do I explain to him his next
step?

Thanks,

April Milliken-Janne
BIOM030@UNLVM.UNL.EDU
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Fri, 10 Apr 1992 16:05:00 CDT
Reply-To:     BTNYMWP@OSUCC.BITNET
From:         BTNYMWP@OSUCC.BITNET
Subject:      women statisticians

Perhaps this is outside of "mainstream statistics", but then,
so am I.  Two important women statisticians in more applied
disciplines are :
   E.C. Pielou, perhaps the most important ecological statistician.
and:
   Isobel Clark, popularizer and developer of some geostatistical
techniques.
   ______________________________________________________
 |                                                    |
 |                                                    |
 |_______________________                             |
Michael W. Palmer        |                *           |
Department of Botany     |               OSU           \
Oklahoma State University|                              |
Stillwater, OK 74078     |                              |
                         |                              |
  Bitnet: BTNYMWP@OSUCC  |                              |
                         |  Believe it or not, there are|
  Phone: 405-744-7717    |  trees in Oklahoma.          |
                          \_                            |
                            \__________   __  _________ |
                                       \_/  \/         \|
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU
X-Subject:      Statistical Minorities
X-To:         EDSTAT-L@ncsuvm.cc.ncsu.edu
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Wed, 8 Apr 1992 22:54:31 ADT
Reply-To:     AA17000 <LAUTARD@UNB.CA>
Comments:     <08APR92.24029999.0031.MUSIC@UNB.CA>
Comments:     Reply-To:     "STATISTICS" <sta010@ABERDEEN.AC.UK>
Comments:     Sender:       "Statistics Education Discussion"
              <EDSTAT-L@NCSUVM.BITNET>
Comments:     From:         "STATISTICS" <sta010@ABERDEEN.AC.UK>
Comments:     To:           Multiple recipients of list EDSTAT-L
              <EDSTAT-L@NCSUVM>
From:         AA17000 <LAUTARD@UNB.CA>
Subject:      Statistical Minorities

David Kerridge asks, re. women as a minority, "surely they are the
majority?"
In most regions of the world, women do outnumber men. Women are a
minority, however, in the sense of lacking effective political power.
Conversely, whites in South Africa are a minority only statistically.
Even statistically, women are actually a minority worldwide: men
outnumber women in Asia (100:95), resulting in women accounting for
less than half (2.63 billion) of the world's 5.3 billion people
(United Nations, THE WORLD'S WOMEN 1970-1990: Trends and Statistics.
New York 1991, p. 11).

Cordially,

Hugh Lautard
--------------------------- Original Message ---------------------------
If we want to be statistical, doesn't everybody belong to a minority?
Aristocrats   (Laplace, Condorcet)
Knights       (RA Fisher)
But women- surely they are the majority?

David Kerridge
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Fri, 17 Apr 1992 13:21:13 EDT
Reply-To:     Mike Palij <palij@XP.PSYCH.NYU.EDU>
From:         Mike Palij <palij@XP.PSYCH.NYU.EDU>
Subject: SPSS net policy (was: SPSS with unequal N
X-To:         EDSTAT-L@ncsuvm.cc.ncsu.edu, nichols%SPSS.COM@ncsuvm.cc.ncsu.edu

>  [Much Useful Information deleted]
>
>
>--
> David Nichols           Statistical Support Specialist            SPSS, Inc.
> Phone: (312) 329-3684     Internet: nichols@spss.com     Fax: (312) 329-3657
>*******************************************************************************
> Any correlation between my views and those of SPSS is strictly due to chance.
>

I have a question though it is unrelated to the content of
your original post.  I don't follow Stat-l regularly and
have not looked at SPSS-l recently so I am surprised to see
info coming from SPSS' internet node.  Several months back
someone on SPSS-l indicated that this node existed and listed
the node address.  However, no policy was stated at that time
about whether SPSS users could/should use email to that node
for questions or advice.  A little while later, when I had a
problem and emailed it to spss.com I received email telling
me not to email questions but rather to phone in the problem.
What is the current policy regarding how acceptable email from
SPSS users?

-Mike Palij/Psychology Dept/New York University
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Original_To:  JNET%"edstat-l@ncsuvm"
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Mon, 13 Apr 1992 09:35:00 CST
Reply-To:     ACADGERRY@STMARYTX.BITNET
From:         ACADGERRY@STMARYTX.BITNET
Subject:      stat or stats?

Sounds like we have a sampling problem here...one observer, and how many
observed, in what manner, etc. From this observers perspective, there is no such
bias in reference to stat or stats...and what would it mean if there were?
No...I'm not insulted, just curious. Gerry Dizinno, St. Mary's Univ., San
Antonio,TX
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Posted-Date: Wed, 15 Apr 92 12:06:18 EDT
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Wed, 15 Apr 1992 12:06:18 EDT
Reply-To:     Tim Arnold <arnold@STAT.NCSU.EDU>
From:         Tim Arnold <arnold@STAT.NCSU.EDU>
Subject:      ICOTS
X-To:         edstat-l@ncsuvm.cc.ncsu.edu

The following message is from David Moore, forwarded to
EdStat-L through me.  Please reply either to
dsm@chi.stat.purdue.edu (David S. Moore) or back to the list.
Thanks,
--Tim
------------------------------------------------------------------

The International Conference on the Teaching of Statistics is
held every fourth year -- the first three ICOTS were in Sheffield,
England; Victoria, BC; and in 1990 in Dunedin, New Zealand.
ICOTS 4 will take place in the summer of 1994 in Marrakesh,
Morocco.  (Yes, there is air conditioning.)

I am the North American representative on the organizing committee.
All committee members have been asked to submit suggestions for
the meeting.  Here's your chance:  Tell me what topics/advances/
accomplishments in statistical education you would like to see on
the ICOTS program.  You can be general or very specific.

Many of the general topics are obvious (though not less important
for that): data in the schools, use of technology, training working
statisticians for industry and government, etc., etc.  Two additional
areas I will suggest are:

        1. Research in learning that refers to statistics or
        probability.  It is important to include the math education
        research community in ICOTS.  They are better-represented
        at ICME (International Congress on Mathematical Education),
        which also occurs on a 4-year cycle, next in August 1992
        in Quebec.  I know Joan Garfield here and am otherwise
        ignorant.

        2. Sessions, or perhaps workshops, on introducing recent
        advances in statistics into beginning instruction, by
        people who have actually done it.  Bootstrap methods are
        one obvious example.  I know the Peter Bruce/Julian Simon
        resampling project here and rumors of other efforts.

Got other names in these areas?  Other session topics (obvious or
not)?  Suggestions for really good presenters?  You can send me
email or post to EDSTAT if you want to prod others.  Thanks for
your help.  And you always wanted an excuse to see Morocco, didn't
you?

David Moore  dsm@stat.purdue.edu
Department of Statistics
Purdue University


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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Wed, 8 Apr 1992 09:47:04 -0600
Reply-To:     wollan@MATH.MTU.EDU
From:         wollan@MATH.MTU.EDU
Subject:      Minorities (R)
X-To:         EDSTAT-L@ncsuvm.cc.ncsu.edu

Ed Johnson asks about minorities in the development of statistics:
  There are at least three sources of cultural information on the
development of statistics:  Constance Reid's "Neyman:  From Life", Joan
Fisher Box's biography of Fisher, and the interviews in Statistical Science
(most issues).  I'd appreciate hearing about others.
  Blackwell is black, but everyone else I can think of is English, Indian,
or Russian, and if they're old enough to be "historical", male...That
probably shows that I need to learn more.  Didn't the ASA sesquicentennial
stuff have some information on women in the history of statistics?

Peter Wollan, wollan@math.mtu.edu
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU
Via: sun3.nsfnet-relay.ac.uk; Wed, 8 Apr 1992 15:06:45 +0100
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Wed, 8 Apr 1992 15:04:26 +0100
Reply-To:     mff@UKC.AC.UK
From:         mff@UKC.AC.UK
Subject:      Women in Statistics
X-To:         EDSTAT-L@ncsuvm.cc.ncsu.edu

There is no better person to start with than Florence Nightingale, the nurse
and passionate statistician. Her graphical displays and effective advocacy
through the use of data are compelling models. A Scientific American article
some years back provides a brief introduction to this pillar of the 19th
century Royal Statistical Society.

Mike Fuller

University of Kent at Canterbury, CT2 7PD, England     (mff@ukc.ac.uk)
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X-Envelope-to: edstat-l@ncsuvm.bitnet
X-VMS-To: IN%"edstat-l@ncsuvm.bitnet"
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Thu, 9 Apr 1992 11:46:00 EDT
Reply-To:     BEINS@ITHACA.BITNET
From:         BEINS@ITHACA.BITNET
Subject:      Statistics for psychology majors

The journal _Teaching of Psychology_ has fairly regular articles about statistic
   s in the psychologty curriculum.  The most recent is by Mark Ware
and Jeffrey Chastain, "Developing selection skills in introductory statistics"
(ToP, Vol. 18(4), 219-222).  It talks about a particular skill, but it also
cites other authors who have addressed revelant issues.

In addition, the APA published a report in 1984, "The undergraduate
psychology curriculum: 1984."  It gives some statistics on statistics.

An overall picture, as of 1981, is given by Bartz, "The statistics course
as a departmental offering and major requirement," _Teaching of Psychology_,
_8_, 106.  It does not give a lot of detail, but gives a concise look at
statistics in psychology.

Finally, as one of the commentators has responded (Prof. Wolfle, I think),
considerations of quantification in psychology are not new.  In 1956,
Buxton lamented inadequate student preparation:  "Despite the difficulty
of dealing with undergraduates whose palms sweat at the thought of numbers or
who are illiterate regarding them, the trend is psychology is quite
certainly toward more quantification."  [Buxton, C. E. (1956).  Issues
in undergraduate education in psychology.  _American Psychologist_, _11_,
84-95.]
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Mon, 13 Apr 1992 15:35:25 EDT
Reply-To:     "Undergrad Stat Comm." <PSY9HIN@BUACCA.BITNET>
From:         "Undergrad Stat Comm." <PSY9HIN@BUACCA.BITNET>
Subject:      Undergrad Texts in Stat

As part of our self review in our statistics offering, we would
appreciate feedback/comments/remarks etc on the style, content,,effectiveness,
friendliness, etc etc  ..of the popular undergraduate texts. We are
particularly intterested to hear from users of:
Heyman
Spence
Runyamn & Haber
Howell
Gravetter

     Evals on other texts will be gravctefully appreciated as well
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X-Delivery-Notice:  SMTP MAIL FROM does not correspond to sender.
X-Envelope-to: edstat-l@ncsuvm.BITNET
X-VMS-To: IN%"edstat-l@ncsuvm"
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Thu, 9 Apr 1992 19:11:00 EST
Reply-To:     Arnie Kahn <FAC_ASKAHN@JMUVAX1.BITNET>
From:         Arnie Kahn <FAC_ASKAHN@JMUVAX1.BITNET>
Subject:      impact of stat

In our department, which happens to be psychology, we've been discussing how to
get students to retain the statistics they learn.  Stat is required and is a
sophomore level course and it is followed by experimental, usually taken as a
sophomore or junior.  But when we do assessment of our seniors we find they
don't do very well on the stat part, and we suspect that unless they're working
with a faculty member on research or doing an honors thesis, they have no
reason to retain what they've learned.  However, we can't make stat a
requirement for our upper-level courses since many of them are required by
students in other majors who've had no stat at all.

Any thoughts?  What's the use of teaching a subject if the students never apply
the information and they just forget it?

Arnie Kahn
fac_askahn@jmuvax (bitnet)
fac_askahn@vax1.acs.jmu.edu (internet)
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Mon, 6 Apr 1992 18:08:00 PDT
Reply-To:     "Peter A. Lachenbruch" <IARSPAL@UCLAMVS.BITNET>
From:         "Peter A. Lachenbruch" <IARSPAL@UCLAMVS.BITNET>
Subject:      gauss

Colleagues - I recently upgraded my Gauss to 3.0 (I'm awaiting the disks, etc.)
 The policy of APTECH is that all upgrades are $195 regardless of your current
version. They offered a $35 discount if you ordered and paid by March 31. This
seems to contradict an earlier message on edstat which indicated a $500 upgrade
price. I've found gauss to be useful and have conducted several simulation
studies with it. I certainly do not use it for my main statistical analyses,
but I often use it to invert matrices, etc. I like it.
Tony
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.edstat-l
Date:         Thu, 16 Apr 1992 09:42:45 MDT
Reply-To:     vokey@HG.ULETH.CA
From:         vokey@HG.ULETH.CA
Subject:      Computational Formulae
X-To:         EDSTAT-L@ncsuvm.cc.ncsu.edu

Computationally inadequate formulae (e.g., the usual computational formulae
for variance designed for hand-calculators that quickly exhaust the numeric
precision of the device) are not necessarily useless; they often express
useful, alternative interpretations.  For example, knowing that the
variance may be expressed as the difference between the mean squared score
and the square of the mean leads to a different and fuller understanding of
the concept of variance despite the fact that computationally the formula
is as bad as the more usual "computational formula" for variance.

John R. Vokey
Department of Psychology
University of Lethbridge
Lethbridge, Alberta
CANADA  T1K 3M4
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.omrscan
Date:         Tue, 14 Apr 1992 09:48:14 EDT
From:         "RPorco (Rosie)" <RPORCO@UOTTAWA.BITNET>
Subject:      OMR AND EXAMS

Hi Friendly OMR users.

I'd truely appreciate an answer to the following.

A) Does your University use OMR scanning services for
   Scoring EXAMS ?
B) Do you have an In-house developed system or a package that scores and
analysis the exams?  What are some of the features?

Can you provide me with a Name and Phone Number of a contact person who
can elaborate on this matter?

                           THANKS in advance for you response.

                           Rosie Porco (613-564-5749)
                           University of Ottawa.
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X-Envelope-to: OMRSCAN@vm.uoguelph.ca
X-VMS-To: IN%"OMRSCAN@vm.uoguelph.ca"
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.omrscan
Date:         Tue, 14 Apr 1992 12:33:00 CST
From:         "Sheila Flory, Computing Services, UofS,
              (966)4825" <FLORY@SASK.USASK.CA>
Subject:      Re: OMR AND EXAMS
X-To:         OMRSCAN@vm.uoguelph.ca

Hi:
  In response to Rosie's query, at Univ. of Sask. we use OMR scanning for
scoring exams via an in-house developed program.  In fact, we have a three
part system which allows users to:
1) generate computer marked exams from item banks
2) score the exam sheets and produce standard reports (item analysis and
	student reports).  The results can also be loaded back into the
	item bank, to maintain a history on the performance of each item.
3) load exam results into a program to maintain history of student results
	over the year.  Marks from papers, labs, etc. can also be loaded
	(manually).  At year-end, instructor can combine scores to get final.

The second part of our system, that scores the OMR sheets, is written in
Fortran.  It produces two ascii files: one containing item information;
the other contains student information. As well as the two types of reports
mentioned above, it can also generate a one-page report for each student,
indicating the student's reponse to each question and correct answers.

I support this system, and can provide more information.

			Sheila Flory
			Computing Services
			Univ. of Sask.  (306-966-4825)
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.omrscan
Date:         Tue, 14 Apr 1992 17:28:46 EDT
From:         Steve Tapp <TAPP@KENTVM.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: OMR AND EXAMS

On Tue, 14 Apr 1992 09:48:14 EDT RPorco (Rosie) said:
>
>A) Does your University use OMR scanning services for
>   Scoring EXAMS ?

At Kent State, test scoring is the second largest application that uses
the scanner.  I would imagine this is the case for most universities.

>B) Do you have an In-house developed system or a package that scores and
>analysis the exams?  What are some of the features?

We use an in-house system written in FORTRAN that runs on VM/CMS.  It
includes most of the standard test score features: Item analysis, freq
table of scores, student lists sorted every which way, scoring options,
multiple keys, grade book, etc.  Still havent figured out how to combine
different keys for the same test together into a single item analisys.
Suggestions anyone??

Steve Tapp   Academic Computer Services, Kent State University
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.omrscan
Date:         Tue, 14 Apr 1992 08:02:53 PDT
From:         "Dallas Platt" <A3DP@PSUORVM.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: OMR AND EXAMS

In response to Rosie Porco's request:

PSU has been using an OPSCAN 5 for several years to capture data for grades,
course request, add/drop of classes, admissions, as well as course/faculty
surveys. With the conversion last year to an on-line student registration
system, the OPSCAN as been used solely for grades capture and surveys.

Recently, there has been quite a bit of interest in OMR test-scoring,
especially with the round of budget cuts we have been seeing. Anything to
cut costs!

We currently have a package from Scanning Dynamics named "Bubble Publishing",
which allows us to design and print our own survey and test forms, using any
HP laserjet II or compatible laser printer and plain copy paper. This program
prints its own skunk and timing marks, as well as the "bubbles", so there is
no need to purchase pre-skunked blanks, such as are marketed by NCS and others.

Bubble Publishing produces a variety of reports, including a nice bar chart.
For test scoring, it prints an ID grid to identify the respondent. This grid
may be pre-slugged with the student's number; the name may be preprinted as
well. Test results include a separate report for each student, with both
percentile and letter grades. BP's one drawback is that it is capable of only
single page surveys and tests.

In addition to Bubble Publishing, PSU uses ScanTools from NCS to read OMR
forms for grading and surveys (Bubble Publishing surveys may be read by
ScanTools also, and combined into 'booklets' of several pages). Surveys
read with ScanTools are then tallied using MicroTEST Survey (NCS).
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