The ISU statistics department was the first recipient of a new award given by the American Statistical Association.

The Statistical Partnerships Among Academe, Industry and Government (SPAIG) Award was given to Iowa State because of its partnership with the Mayo Clinic and General Motors.

“[The award] gave us excellent visibility at a national meeting,” said Dean Isaacson, professor and former head of the Department of Statistics.

Jeanene Harris, public affairs and board staff specialist for the American Statistical Association, said the award was established to recognize “outstanding partnerships.”

She said the award was given to Iowa State, General Motors Corporation and the Mayo Clinic because of the distance education program offered to General Motors and Mayo Clinic employees through Iowa State and research opportunities available to ISU faculty.

The award was also given for improvements found in both the statistical practice within the two industries, and within Iowa State’s curriculum for students looking towards industrial and biostatistical careers.

Isaacson said the award helped to strengthen Iowa State’s partnerships with the two industries.

The partnership with GM began in 1994 with a distance education program that allowed GM employees to obtain a masters of science degree in statistics from Iowa State.

This enabled employees to both know what curriculum changes there were in the field of statistics and learn the most current approaches of collecting and analyzing data, Isaacson said.

The partnership was enhanced after Iowa State received a National Science Foundation grant that allowed two statistics professors to each spend one month at GM.

Students are also benefiting from the collaborations. ISU students have gone to GM and Mayo Clinic for summer internships. Graduates are now working for both organizations.

Students also have access to medical data through three statisticians from Mayo Clinic who are collaborating professors for Iowa State.

The professors were able to give seminars as well as discover what some of the problems were that the companies faced.

“Statisticians working at a university need to know what the problems are in industry and government,” Isaacson said.

Statisticians help to develop various testing methods that occur within industry and to analyze the data that comes from the testing, Isaacson said.

For example, tests at GM where cars are sprayed with salt solution, driven through stainless steel potholes and forced to spin on ice-covered blacktop involve statisticians input.

Statisticians are also needed in the medical field, which is one of the reasons Iowa State works with the Mayo Clinic.

“A lot of problems involving human health use statistical procedures to determine causes and cures,” Isaacson said.

Iowa State communicates with its partnering companies through primarily phone calls and e-mail.

“We are not close to major industries,” Isaacson said as he pointed out a picture of himself in a cornfield.

Iowa State’s partnerships prove “you don’t have to be close,” Isaacson said. “Anybody can form partnerships.”

In the future, Isaacson said, he would like to see more exchange of personnel, more seminars and more collaboration between Iowa State and both industrial and government partners.

“I’m hoping that partnerships continue to grow,” Isaacson said.

He also said the partnerships have provided “an open door for exchange of ideas and resources.”