The Statistical Society of Australia

The Statistical Society of Australia was founded in 1962:-

... as a national "umbrella" organisation to support and further the work of state statistical societies already in existence, to establish a national journal and newsletter and to host national conferences.

The first state statistical society was the Statistical Society of New South Wales (see [2]) which was founded in 1947. Henry Oliver Lancaster was one of the founders of this Society and his contributions are detailed in [3]. The Statistical Society of Australia grew out of the state societies and these are now represented by six branches: the Canberra Branch; the New South Wales Branch; the Queensland Branch; the South Australian Branch; the Victorian Branch; and the Western Australian Branch. Total membership of the Statistical Society of Australia now stands at around 1000.

The Society, soon after it was founded, organised a number of Sections on specific statistical topics. These have the following aims:

1. Provision of a forum through which members who are interested in a particular aspect of statistics, in academia, government and industry, can exchange views and ideas.
   
2. Promotion of networking among members on topics of mutual professional interest.
   
3. Organisation of ongoing professional development of interest to members and the wider community, through workshops, seminars or competitions.
   
4. Contribution to the Society's biennial conference through nominating international speakers and organising sessions.
   
5. Dissemination of information of interest to members, including national and international professional activities, relevant conferences, job opportunities.
   
6. Development of links with related societies.
   
7. Interaction across the profession, including links with related societies and encouragement of other statisticians and non-statisticians to join the Society, take part in activities and see themselves as part of the broader statistical community.
   

The Australian Journal of Statistics has been published since 1959. In 1998 the Statistical Society of Australia and the New Zealand Statistical Association amalgamated their two journals and from that time jointly published The Australian and New Zealand Journal of Statistics.

JOC/EFR August 2004	School of Mathematics and Statistics University of St Andrews, Scotland
The URL of this page is: http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Societies/FILENAME.html