Statistician

A statistician applies mathematical principles to the collection, analysis and presentation of data, usually in regard to surveys and social and scientific experiments. As such, a master's degree in mathematics or statistics is the minimum requirement for a basic industrial statistician position. More research intensive positions may require a PhD, as do most academic postings. A position with the Federal government requires at least a BA in statistics or mathematics.

For employment, as an entry-level statistician, a potential statistician will need a bachelor's degree as well as 15 semester hours minimum of statistics. A mix of 15 hours of mathematics and statistics, if at least 6 hours are in statistics, is also acceptable in most cases.

A position as a mathematical statistician with the Federal government requires 24 semester hours of mathematics and statistics, along with a minimum of 6 semester hours in statistics. 12 semester hours in an area of advanced mathematics (i.e. calculus or vector analysis) is also required.

This past year alone, at least 200 different universities offered a degree program in both mathematics and statistics. Other schools offered graduate-level courses in applied statistics for students majoring in various fields, including biology, business, economics, education, engineering and psychology.

A statistician collects and analyzes numerical data in order to present said data in an informative and understandable manner. Accuracy scales, opinion polls and average earning charts for various occupations are all the work of statisticians.

In addition, statisticians may be called upon to use their knowledge of various statistical methods for a number of other professional areas, such as economics, biology, psychiatry, engineering, public health, medicine, psychology, marketing, public education and professional sports.

Decisions in the social, political and economic arenas cannot often be made without the input of a statistician, and the data a statistician provides can make the difference between a law being passed or not.

In the world of business, statisticians play a role in quality control, as well as in development and improvement. In addition to these areas, some statisticians are also involved in decision making in regards to what products are manufactured, how much will be charged for said products and what the eventual target market for the products will be. Statisticians have also been known to manage assets and liabilities departments, determining the risks of certain investments as well as their predicted returns.

The majority of statisticians are employed by the Federal government. However, every major government agency will have in-house statisticians to help with data collection, organization and eventual presentation. While in the employ of the government, statisticians may develop surveys measuring population growth, consumer prices or unemployment. A Statistician who is working for scientific, environmental or agricultural agencies may find themselves devising tests to measure the average level of pesticides in drinking water, the number of endangered species local to a certain area, or even the number of people with a particular disease or illness. Statisticians also are employed in by the military, where they determine the accuracy of new weapons and the likely effectiveness of various defense strategies.

Good communications skills are important for all prospective statisticians. They will often be called upon to explain the technical matters of their gathered data to persons without expertise in statistics. Continuing education in regards to both statistical method as well as newly developed statistical technology is important for statisticians as they will need to keep their knowledge up to date in order to perform to a high standard in their chosen field.

With regards to statistical positions involving quality control and general employee improvement, some training in engineering, physical science and basic psychology could be considered useful.

An understanding of basic biological, chemical or health science could be important for any positions involved with chemicals or agriculture.

Knowledge of economics and business administration can prove helpful for many statistics-related jobs in the fields of market research and business analysis. An understanding of business and economic theory can certainly be valuable as well.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics in the US stated that the median annual earnings of statisticians was $65,720 in 2006. The highest 10 percent of all statisticians earned more than $108,630 per year, while 80 percent of all statisticians earned between $48,480 and $87,850 per year. The bottom 10 percent of statisticians earned less than $37,010.

The average earnings of statisticians who worked for one of the various bureaus of the Federal government was $85,690 annually in 2007, and mathematical statisticians averaged in at $96,121 per year.

John Wilder Tukey (1915 - 2000) was a Statistics professor at Princeton University. He introduced the box plot in his 1977 book 'Exploratory Data Analysis', and he contributed to the practice of statistics and examined the difference between exploratory data analysis and confirmatory data analysis.

Jerome H. Friedman is currently a top researcher in statistical data mining. He has been a Professor of Statistics at Stanford University for close to 20 years. Friedman's work has been widely published in varying areas of statistics.

There are several notable organizations dedicated to the field of statistics. Among them are the IASI (the Inter-American Statistical Institute), which was organized to promote statistical development in the US.

The International Statistical Institute seeks to develop and improve statistical methods as well as the ways they are applied. This is done through the promotion of international activity and co-operation.

As the methods for calculating statistics increases along with technology, so to do the number of jobs for potential statisticians.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Stamford, Connecticut is the city with the highest per year wage for statisticians. Coming in a close second is Gaithersburg, Maryland, and San Francisco, California coming in third with $95,080 per year being the average salary.