100th Celebration Ideas

Committee chair:  Marcia Testa

General:  How about using the spatial statistics book that was donated as a prize for the best suggestion (and execution of) for a giveaway (e.g. mugs)?

 

Booth

Make double-size, or go in with Health Administration and make a corner quadruple-size setting.

Give away mugs or other fancy trinkets to Stat Section members who stop by.

The statistics jokes we have at the booth have been popular.
Perhaps a mug with a joke or two printed on it would also be popular,
both with our members and with others (if we find the right joke).
Could be given away to Stat section members and sold to others.

 Make life-size cutout figures of famous statisticians in our history.

Make big banner.

Modularize current poster, updating it.

Get folding boards, velcro (the verb!) pics and other signs to it.

Have a large sheet cake (perhaps with a stat cartoon or picture of
Lowell Reed, etc. on it ) at the booth on Monday.  Have one of those
room-wide announcements made about the cake sometime in the afternoon
and cut it up and give it out.

Get one of those mini casino tables and let people play craps to win prizes at the booth (i.e., post odds on the table for winning different bets, stake people with $100 funny money and then see if they can win anything)

Create Map of the 100 locations APHA has been held since the Statistics Section has been created

Give out "Honorary Statistician" buttons, ribbons, etc. if people can answer Statistics trivia (that would mean we would have to create trivia questions as well)

15 minute consulting booth (i.e., set up a booth for people to get 15 minutes of statistical consulting)

Since we will be in San Diego, we can give out Statistics Section Hats

For the booth, what about a contest similar to the one Scott Zeger described in his talk?  A large bowl of something (e.g. M+Ms, coins, hershey kisses); ask for an interval estimate, winner is the smallest interval estimate that covers the true value.

 

Sessions

Get APHA to devote one of the plenary sessions to us and have a talk
that will appeal to a broad audience that involves statistics in some
way --contributions over the past hundred years, using statistics to
find voting fraud or how it is involved in poling, climate change, etc.

Bring in a really big name person for a special talk.

Hold a contest "Are you smarter than a statistician" similar to "Are you smarter than a 5th grader" that we hold Tuesday afternoon in which we have a team of 3 statisticians compete against any team of 3 people in answering 5-10 statistical questions. Prize can be free APHA membership for the team (i.e., 3 free memberships, which include statistics as the primary section)

Invited sessions on history of APHA, the Statistics Section and Statistics

For an invited session, I'd love to see a session on influenza vaccine effectiveness.  There's been a controversy brewing for the past couple years, as the results from RCT data do not agree with observational or surveillance data.  The topic is current, there are some interesting statistical issues, and it is an important public health problem.  I can think of several terrific speakers to invite.

 

Parties

Throw a big bash with live music.

Have our big bash in a room adjoining Health Administration's big
bash so people can go back and forth between them. 

Invite APHA officers and other section's officers and section
counselors to our bash.

Have door prizes
Give statistic section members 2 free drink coupons (and our invited
guests).  If we can afford to give all who attend 2 free drink tickets,
great.  Otherwise consider subsidize other drinks to make cost more
palatable for people who come, but not onerous for us.

 

Publications

See if the Nation's Health would donate (or give us a cheap rate)
1/2 page in the Nation's Health 3-4 times during the year.  Put a short
blurb about a significant contribution of statistics to public health
during the past 100 years in the space, plus something like: In
celebration of the 100th anniversary of the APHA Statistics Section.
Celebrate with us in San Diego."  Make the space colorful-memorable in
some way.

Special issue in AJPH or Nation's Health

Get an article written about the Stat section and its 100th
anniversary in Amstat News.  Could include mentions of the Speigelman
Award and our liaison with ASA about short courses at APHA.

 Make glossy booklet of our history.

 

Other

Send brief monthly email blasts to our members with updates on what
is planned for San Diego  (for example special sessions lined up,
plenary speakers, party details, etc. Show a running contributions tally
-list big contributors.  Ask for suggestions. Provide a link to our web
site in each email, plus to members of the Celebration committee.

 

Fund-raising

Approach Deans and Biostat Depts

Approach Software manufacturers/CROs

Auction/Sell member consultative services

 

 

Send ideas to LMOULTON@JHSPH.EDU for posting, and simultaneously to TESTA@HSPH.HARVARD.EDU for consideration by the planning committee.