The Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science is a top-tier academic unit among statistical and actuarial science globally. Our community is engaged in topics such as actuarial science, biostatistics, data science, quantitative finance, statistics, & statistics-computing. Our department is home to 70 full-time faculty researching diverse and exciting areas, over 2000 undergraduate students from around the world, and approximately 200 graduate students in master, doctoral, and professional programs.
News
Professor Nathaniel Stevens Recipient ENBIS 2023 Young Statistician Award
The Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science congratulates professor Nathaniel Stevens on being named the winner of the European Network for Business and Industrial Statistics (ENBIS)2023 Young Statistician Award. This achievement is awarded for the "recognize the work of young people in introducing innovative methods, promoting the use of statistics and/or successfully using it in the daily practice."
PhD alum Dr. Joy Jiang’s breast cancer research reaches The New York Times
Waterloo alum Dr. Joy (Shu) Jiang (PhD Statistics ‘18) continues to make headlines for her ground-breaking breast cancer research.
As an associate professor of Surgery at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Jiang develops “statistical methods for precision oncology with a direct focus on breast cancer.” Her broader research is particularly concerned with addressing racial disparities in the medical field and improving statistical models to better reflect differing experiences of women of various races.
“Women’s health, in the past, has not been a big focus compared to other areas of research,” Jiang says. “We know that breast cancer is the leading cancer in women, but the risk prediction stratification strategies are still not up to standards compared to other disease areas.”
Full story on the Faculty of Math site.
Meet PhD graduate Dr. Carlos Andrés Araiza Iturria
Dr. Carlos Andrés Araiza Iturria recently completed a PhD in actuarial science. His doctoral research and dissertation, “Discrimination in insurance pricing,” was co-supervised by Dr. Mary Hardy and Dr. Paul Marriott.
The main objective of his research is to understand when and how either direct or indirect discrimination can arise in insurance pricing and suggest feasible guidelines that can mitigate its detrimental impact on society.
“I think that people who finish their PhD with a smile on their face are those that do two things,” he continues. “They research what they are passionate about, and they don’t let their degree consume their whole life. At the end of the day, we need to love and be loved, have fun and stay healthy.”
Read the full profile of Dr. Araiza Iturria, and PhD graduates from the other five Faculties, on the UW News site.