Reflecting on the RSS 2021 Conference

A holiday for statisticians went to Manchester this year.

The Royal Statistical Society international conference went to Manchester for 2021. This conference had both in-person events — some of which were online — and online talks.

The conference started in the main auditorium.

Opening the conference

Organisers asked me to help open the conference with presentations about Covid-19 statistics. This talk was to focus on my voluntary work with the Royal Statistical Society. I admit I was mildly worried.

(Image: Tumblr)

I had a 10-minute slot, so I went through:

• The Statistical Ambassador programme: We help journalists, policy-makers, researchers, and the public understand statistics.
• Challenges of communication Covid-19 statistics: These numbers are often novel, with a need for context, and limited space.
• Ambassadors’ Guide: In April 2020, the Ambassadors published a guide to coronavirus numbers. That article came out of a discussion led by Dr Deirdre Toher.
• Posting on Medium: As you can tell, I write about statistical issues on Medium.