RSSeNEWS to be determined...

If you have not seen Marlon Brando in the film On the Waterfront, then you can get the video. But, if you miss the RSS ‘on the waterfront’ conference, there will not be a second chance. Let me, therefore, extend an invitation to all to join us at the Brighton Convention Centre from 13 to 17 September for both a scientific (and waterfront) experience.

The programme committee have put together sessions which we hope will have appeal to all in the Society. Our aim was to provide the opportunity both to engage with others working in members’ particular areas of interest and to allow all who attend to learn something of work in other areas. The many areas will be of interest in themselves but will also provide insight into how the challenges of our subject cut across areas and reflect the unity and diversity of our society.

In particular, we look forward to the plenary sessions, one organised by our Significance team, and others that will feature Tim Davis on statistical engineering, Peter Donnelly on statistical genetics, Robert Groves on censuses, Nancy Reid on likelihood, and Robert Stine on financial statistics. There will also be another `retrospective read paper’, presented by Rob Tibshirani on the lasso.

The systematic component of the conference has two aspects, the scientific programme and the range of social events. The latter includes a welcome reception at the Brighton Sealife Centre, a fish and chips evening on Brighton Pier and the conference dinner, all conveniently located ‘on the waterfront’. The random component also has two elements, who will be there and the weather. The uncertainty of the weather we cannot control but we can be hopeful. The uncertainty of the attendees has been reduced by the numbers of our committed speakers. I hope that many others will join them and help reduce uncertainty further by visiting www.rss.org.uk/rss2010 where the conference programme can be seen and where one can register for the conference, with 10 per cent discounts still available until 9 August.

Please do consider joining us.

Vern Farewell, chair, programme committee, RSS 2010

Conference at a glance: day-by-day

Pre-conference programme - Monday 13 September

One-day courses

Course A: Principles of statistical design

Presented by George Casella (University of Florida)

Course B: Emulators for computer simulation models

Presented by Tony O’Hagan, Peter Challenor and other members of the MUCM project (University of Sheffield)

Young Statisticians Training Day

How to make the most of the RSS conferences

Afternoon workshops

Workshop A: Management by fact

Presented by Roland Caulcutt and Tony Brown

Workshop B: Evidence-based policy making

Evening event: Welcome reception at Brighton Sealife centre

Confirmed plenary speakers and topics

Tuesday 14 September

Plenary speaker: Peter Donnelly (University of Oxford)

Topics

• Adaptive clinical trials
• Biodiversity and climate change
• Composite likelihood
• Models of epidemiology and immunology
• Statistics and the law

Poster reception

Evening event: A night on the pier

Wednesday 15 September

Plenary speakers: Robert Groves (US Census Bureau), Tim Davis (Jaguar Land Rover)

Topics

• 2011 UK census
• Best of RSC 2010
• Building trust in statistics
• Continuing professional development
• Learning from statistical education
• Primary health care
• Retrospective read paper (Rob Tibshirani)
• Scientific analysis in policy-making

• Sequential Monte Carlo

Thursday 16 September

Plenary speakers: Nancy Reid (University of Toronto), Robert Stine (University of Pennsylvania)

Topics

• Best of the RSS journals
• Best of YSM 2010
• Data capture
• Financial statistics
• Opinion polling in the 2010 UK General Election
• Risk
• UK National Statistics

Evening event: Conference dinner with guest speaker Andrew Dilnot

Friday 17 September

Significance plenary: Danny Dorling (University of Sheffield) on Nobel prizes and sweet peas

Yan Wong on Do cows point north?

Topics

• History of statistics
• Important topics in genetics
• Measuring progress
• Performance indicators

The full programme and registration details is available from the conference website.