IASC News December 2019
ERS-IASC BoD Elections for 2020-2024
Every second year, five out of the ten regular members of the Board of Directors of the European
Regional Section of the International Association for Statistical Computing are elected for a period of
four years. Furthermore, a chairperson elect is elected for two years who will become chairperson for
the two consecutive years. The selection committee found five suitable candidates from different fields
of computational statistics and different countries for the Board of Directors as well as a candidate for
the chairperson elect. In consensus with the Board of Directors it was decided to declare them elected
without formal vote of the members. We are happy to welcome Maria Brigida Ferraro (Italy) as the
chairperson elect for ERS-IASC starting her term in August 2020. We also welcome Massimiliano
Caporin (Italy), Karel Hron (Czech Republic), Myriam Maumy-Bertrand (France), Sara Taskinen
(Finland), and Stefan van Aelst (Belgium) as new members of the Board of Directors for the period 2020– 2024.
COMSTAT 2020 Conference in Bologna
The 24th International Conference on Computational Statistics will take place at the University of
Bologna, Italy, 25-28 August 2020 (http://www.compstat2020.org ). The conference will include invited
special sessions on “Robust statistics” (Organizer: Peter Filzmoser), “Bootstrap and resampling in
cluster analysis” (Organizer: Christian Hennig), “Bayesian extreme value analysis” (Organizer: Miguel
de Carvalho), “Causality and distributional robustness” (Organizer: Peter Buehlmann), and “Applications
for data visualizations” (Organizer: Juergen Symanzik). Furthermore, two tutorial will be offered on
“Text-mining in Econometrics” (Peter WInker, University of Giessen, Germany) and “Tail dependence
with Copulas” (Fabrizio Durante, University of Salento, Italy).
IASC-ERS also announces that it will offer up to three prizes, each worth of five hundred euros, for the
three best contributions submitted by young participants (younger than 35 years on August 31, 2020).
The deadline for submission of abstracts for contributed talks and posters is 17 April 2020. The deadline
for invited and for contributed talks to organized sessions is 15 May 2020.
IASC ISI Nominations Committee for the Period 2019-2021
Rosaria Lombardo, the IASC ISI Nominations Officer, announced the other members of the ISI
Nominations Committee. This committee is in charge of identifying deserving IASC members and help
them become ISI Elected Members .
Rosaria Lombardo (Chair), University of Campania “Vanvitelli”, Italy
Michel van de Velden, University of Rotterdam, Netherlands
Paulo Canas Rodrigues, Federal University of Bahia, Brazil
Junji Nakano, Chuo University, Japan
Geoffrey John McLachlan, University of Queensland, Australia
Thanks to Rosaria, Michel, Paulo, Junji, and Geoffrey for serving on this committee.
Forthcoming Event: LACSC 2020 5th Latin American Conference on Statistical Computing
The 5 th Latin American Conference on Statistical Computing (LACSC 2020) will be held in Ciudad
de México, México, from June 9 to June 11, 2020. This international conference is jointly organized by
the Department of Statistics and the Department of Industrial & Operations Engineering of the Instituto
Autónomo de México (ITAM), the Latin American Regional Section of the International Association for
Statistical Computing (LARS-IASC) and the International Statistical Institute (ISI).
The theme of the conference is “Statistical Computing for Intelligent Decision Making”. The aim of LACSC is to
foster the progress of the theory, methods and practice of statistical computing in Latin America, and to become the
main meeting point of the statistical computing scientific community in LA. This year, the call of papers of the
conference gives an account of the interest of academics, scientists and professionals in methodological aspects of
statistical computing and relevant applications for the Latin American community.
LACSC 2020 invites to submit papers, contributed paper sessions and invited paper sessions before February 20, 2020.
The call of papers and all the information is available at lacsc2020.itam.mx.
You cannot miss LACSC 2020! The Local Organizing Committee is also organizing an interesting social
program. Mexico City is the capital of the United Mexican States (official name of the country). Originally
this city was built on an islet where some natives found an eagle devouring a snake and was called
Tenochtitlan. Chinampas for agriculture were built around it and became the capital of the Aztec Empire.
With the arrival of the Spaniards in 1521, Mexico City fell under its dominance and became the center
of the economic activity of the power of New Spain. Its outstanding colonial architecture earned it
recognition as the City of Palaces. Currently, Mexico City stands in a valley surrounded by volcanoes,
proud of its heritage, the product of the fusion of two cultures. It is the largest and most populous city in
Latin America and one of the most dynamic capitals in the world; It has a large number of museums,
theaters, concert halls, archaeological ruins, theme parks and recreational parks. Also, it offers a great
gastronomic variety typical of all regions of Mexico and the world. Please see more information on the
following links: www.visitmexico.com and www.lonelyplanet.com
Forthcoming Event: 3rd LARS-IASC School on Computational Statistics and Data Science
The Third LARS-IASC School on Computational Statistics and Data Science will be held in Ciudad
de México, México, from June 7 to June 8, 2020. This is a satellite event of the 5 th Latin American
Conference on Statistical Computing, LACSC 2020. The school is jointly organized by the Instituto
Autónomo de México (ITAM), the Latin American Regional Section of the International Association for
Statistical Computing (LARS-IASC) and the International Statistical Institute (ISI).
The main purpose of the school is to spread the knowledge base and advances in Statistical Computing
in Latin American countries and to increase the quantity of researchers and data scientists in the field.
The program is organized around three axes: knowledge base and advances, software and data science
applications. It is oriented to postgraduate students, researchers and practitioners in statistics and data
science.
This year the school theme is Stochastic Simulation and Reinforcement Learning. The website of the school is at
lacsc2020.itam.mx. For LARS-IASC students, the IASC will provide:
a. up to 10 scholarships – 100% waiver in registration fee for people living in developing countries (low income countries and
lower middle income countries);
b. 1 full scholarship that includes registration fee, travel, and stay expenses.
To apply for these scholarships, the candidates must:
• Be a member of the International Association for Statistical Computing (IASC). More information on
how to become a member can be found here.
• At the time of the application and of the events be living and working/studying in a developing
country.
ITAM’s mission is to contribute to the individual’s comprehensive education and to develop a freer, more
just, and prosperous society. In order to achieve its research, teaching, and outgrowth endeavors, ITAM
aims to reach the highest levels of academic excellence in an environment promoting the plurality of
ideas and respectful of ethnic, cultural, and religious differences. Our institution’s goal is to prepare and
educate women and men that are capable of acting in an informed, rational, responsible, critical way,
and committed to creating, managing, and shaping public opinion, institutions, as well as further works.
It also intends that these women and men be capable of creating and transmitting knowledge of the
highest ethical, scientific, technological, and professional levels, allowing society to become aware of its
problems and contributing to their understanding and solutions www.itam.mx.
Reminder: Free Access to Computational Statistics and Data Analysis (CSDA) in Print& Online
As a member of IASC, you automatically gain free access to Elsevier’s CSDA journal. Upon request,
you can also obtain the print issues of CSDA at no extra cost. Please select this option in your upcoming
membership renewal and also send a confirmatory e-mail to Margaret de Ruiter-Molloy at the ISI
Permanent Office if you want to obtain the free print issues. If you were an IASC member in 2018 and/or
2019 and intended to obtain the print issues, but did not receive them, also reach out to Margaret by the
end of January 2020. Similarly, if you cannot access the CSDA articles online, also reach out to
Margaret. Likely, you need a new access token or password from Elsevier.
Download: 2019-12_IASC