News & Views item - February 2007

 

 

Critical Shortage of Statisticians Highlighted by the Incoming President of the Statistical Society of Australia. (February 28, 2007)

    William Dunsmuir heads the statistics department at the University of New South Wales; in an opinion piece in the Higher Education Section of today's Australian he adds his voice to the growing concern of the shortage of properly qualified mathematicians and statisticians in Australia and the this is having a significantly detrimental effect on Australia's economic growth.

 

He writes:

[S]erious concerns began to surface [concerning the state of statistics in Australia] about five years ago. It became clear there was an increasing shortfall of graduates suitably educated in statistics to meet the needs of employers in business, industry, government and academe. This had become so critical for large employers such as the Australian Bureau of Statistics, CSIRO and certain commercial enterprises that the matter was taken up with the then federal education, science and technology minister , Brendan Nelson.

 

The chief response by the Statistical Society of Australia was a review completed in late 2005. The report, Statistics at Australian Universities, was wide ranging, also taking in school education and involvement of employer groups.

Among the recommendations made in the 48 page report was a request of the then Minister for Education, Science and Training, Brendan Nelson, that "As a matter of urgency, to reconsider the Relative Funding Model to ensure a more equitable funding arrangement for statistics in universities, bringing funding for statistics courses into line with the current funding levels for computer science courses."

 

So far the federal government has done nothing of consequence to address even this request.

 

Nevertheless professor Dunsmuir writes in today's opinion piece, "I left the Canberra forum [of February 7, Australia's Future: Why the Mathematical Sciences Matter] feeling that although the mathematical sciences are at a critical point, there is hope for a turnaround. But this will not happen without the continued and collaborative efforts of the professional societies and peak bodies that attended the forum. Political support is crucial and there are very positive signs that this is emerging from both sides of politics... [but in addition] each sector of the mathematical sciences - including employers - needs to take action and cannot sit back and wait until the problem is solved for them... the success of Biostatistics Collaboration of Australia, a graduate training program delivered by six universities [is] a superb example of how the institutions can work together with the support of government to solve a critical skills shortage."

 

With the impending federal election and if the voting public can be made to believe that the matter is of significant consequence, just maybe Professor Dunsmuir's may not just be whistling in the wind.