Statistics Education in the Health Sciences

Dear JSE Readers,

I am thrilled to announce on behalf of the JSE Editorial Board the creation of a new section of the journal focused on statistics education in the health sciences. This new section fits in well with the JSE mission to “disseminate knowledge for the improvement of statistics education at all levels, including elementary, secondary, postsecondary, postgraduate, continuing, and workplace education.” Statistics knowledge is needed to read and understand the health literature, and future health professionals are usually required to complete one or more graduate level health-oriented statistics courses. Although substantial funding dollars, research projects, and publications in the statistics education research literature have been dedicated to statistics education research for college students, fewer resources and dissemination possibilities have been available for the promotion of statistics education research in the health sciences.

JSE has played a central role in the reform movement and modernization of statistics education. With the second iteration of the Guidelines for Assessment and Instruction in Statistics Education (GAISE) report, much progress has been made (GAISE 2016). The report recommendations represent a modernization of statistics education for introductory statistics courses at the college level and pre-K-12 years. There are now clear guidelines for the development and delivery of a first undergraduate course in statistics, as well as growing knowledge about the second undergraduate course. The GAISE report is profoundly important, and its dissemination and implementation essential for the growth and development of statistics as a discipline.

As a statistics educator in a school of public health, I am challenged with making curricula decisions and developing classroom instruction to appropriately teach biostatistics courses to graduate public health students. Although the research findings published in JSE have historically not been health focused, I have been able to make use of the journal's many issues and reports over the years in the development and delivery of my courses. The principles of good science and sound statistical thinking and reasoning are arguably discipline invariant. Further, although the GAISE report does not specifically address graduate or health sciences statistics education, its recommendations are sensible and straightforward to extend and implement, and certainly align with the modern day focus across disciplines in higher education on active learning in the classroom. In addition, another valuable important resource has been membership in the American Statistical Association (ASA) Section on Teaching of Statistics in the Health Sciences, whose mission is “devoted to excellence in teaching statistics and conducting statistics education research in the health sciences.” However, to date, there has not been funding available, nor a targeted publication outlet, for health-focused statistics education research.

It would be interesting to quantify successful dissemination and implementation of GAISE. As a statistics educator with a primary appointment in the academic nursing discipline from 2008 to 2014, I networked with more than 50 statistics educators teaching biostatistics courses in graduate nursing programs. I discovered through interaction and networking that very few of these statistics educators were aware of the GAISE report. Many were teaching old school statistics, without awareness of the development of knowledge of how to modernize statistics education. This bothered me a lot. As a result, I eventually developed a manuscript aimed specifically at making the GAISE report accessible and visible for statistics educators in the academic nursing discipline (Hayat 2014). Further extensions of the GAISE report are needed for faculty in other health science disciplines, including dentistry, medicine, pharmacy, and public health.

Data are also needed to make curriculum decisions. As an example, I served on a committee comprised of biostatistics faculty tasked with the development of a new program for Master in Public Health students with a concentration in biostatistics. During our committee discussions about developing the core courses for this program, there was an inescapable reality that we were making decisions about the content and sequencing of our courses without an evidence basis to draw from. As a result of this experience, I was fortunate to be part of a team effort to study the public health research literature and quantify the types of statistical methods being used and reported (Hayat et al. 2017). Of course, those data did not assess the correctness of use of statistical methods and models, but did provide an evidence basis for understanding which methods needed to be taught and understood in order to read and access the public health research literature. More studies like these are needed to assess statistical methods used throughout the health sciences.

We kick off this new section focused on health sciences with two interesting articles. The first, an article about “The Importance of Statistical Competencies for Medical Research Learners” by Oster and Enders (2018), describes why the development, teaching, and assessment of statistical competencies for medical professionals and medical researchers are critical tasks. The second article, “Findings from a Survey of Statistics and Biostatistics Instructors in the Health Sciences Who Teach Using an Online or Flipped Format” by Schwartz et al. (2018), summarizes results of a survey of statistics educators in the health sciences.

Thank you for your interest in JSE. We hope you are as excited as we are about this new addition to the journal, and look forward to your contributions!