Teaching and Mentoring Statements

Teaching. I take great pride in my ability to teach essential principles in applied statistics and survey methodology to students, faculty, and primary researchers using clear and straightforward pedagogical techniques. My teaching style (and my general philosophy about statistics and survey methodology) generally emulates the training that I received from several distinguished statisticians who have had a tremendous impact on my career in applied statistics, especially Julian Faraway, Ed Rothman, Fred Bookstein, Steve Heeringa, and Jim Lepkowski. I am indebted to these individuals and the others who have trained me for their teaching and guidance.

Since the Survey Research Center hired me in November of 2011, I have been extremely active teaching courses in the Michigan Program in Survey Methodology (MPSM) and the Joint Program in Survey Methodology (JPSM, based at the University of Maryland-College Park), each of which grants Masters degrees and PhD degrees in Survey Methodology. Since the time of my hiring, I have been either the only instructor or a co-instructor for numerous graduate-level for-credit courses in MPSM and JPSM (1 or 2 classes per semester, and 9 unique classes): Applied Sampling (primary instructor and co-instructor), Survey Practicum I (co-instructor), Analysis of Complex Sample Survey Data (primary instructor), Survey Practicum II (co-instructor), Inference for Complex Surveys (co-instructor), Total Survey Error I (primary and co-instructor), Total Survey Error II (co-instructor), Applications of Statistical Modeling (primary instructor), and Measurement Error Models (primary instructor). I also serve as the primary instructor of an eight-week class on the analysis of complex sample survey data for the ISR Summer Institute in Survey Research Techniques (taken by some participants for academic credit). The variety of courses that I have taught reflects my broad spectrum of research interests, and my ability to speak multiple languages in survey methodology and applied statistics.

At a faculty retreat in late 2013, the MPSM and JPSM faculty expressed their collective desire to develop a course on applications of statistical modeling that was designed to be a required course for students on both the statistical and social science tracks of these programs. I developed the aforementioned Applications of Statistical Modeling course from scratch during the first eight months of 2014, providing coverage of topics that are not given sufficient time in other MPSM and JPSM courses (e.g., multilevel modeling and structural equation modeling) with an applied focus appealing to both tracks of students. The first four offerings of this course were quite popular, with it most recently having been taught in Fall of 2018. I also introduced a readings course on Measurement Error Models in the Winter 2015 semester for PhD students, and each of the students enrolled praised the quality of the one-on-one sessions with me that this course facilitated. I am proud of the fact that all of the students in this class used their exchanges with me to develop sound proposals for their upcoming comprehensive exams.

I truly value my ability to be an effective teacher, and I spend a great deal of time and effort working on this craft. I have made several trips to the University of Maryland-College Park and the U.S. Census Bureau for JPSM classes to meet students face-to-face, and I strive to give students detailed feedback on their work, whether it be mathematical proofs in a course on inference for complex surveys or a final paper in a course on Total Survey Error. I specifically demand high writing quality, and give students extensive feedback on their grammar and presentation (in addition to technical content) in written papers. English is a second language for many MPSM students, and I want these students to leave our program with a learned ability to write clearly, regardless of the subject matter. Students in the Applications of Statistical Modeling course are required to develop analysis papers describing the results of advanced modeling exercises, and these papers are graded based on their ability to demonstrate correct 1) execution of techniques, 2) interpretation of results, and 3) English grammar. Maintaining a healthy teaching-research balance has been extremely difficult, but I can say with certainty that I have done my best. I will strive to continue learning from my experiences teaching these courses so that future offerings will continue to represent improvements over previous offerings.

Mentoring. To date, I have served on the dissertation committees of six PhD students who have successfully defended their dissertations (Zhou, Watts, Antoun, Liu, Mittereder, and Sharma; see my CV). On each of these committees, I carefully reviewed the written and technical work of the candidates to ensure that the resulting dissertations were of the highest quality. I chaired the dissertation committee of Felicitas Mittereder, who is now at Facebook. I have also served on numerous comprehensive exam committees, where I have provided students with critical feedback on their written exams and evaluated their ability to move forward in the PhD program based on the studies that they have proposed. Serving on these committees has often required one-on-one meetings with these students to discuss approaches or techniques, and I strongly believe that all of these students have benefitted from their interactions with me in this regard. I strive to make myself available for these discussions despite my other commitments.

I have a special interest in helping to mentor PhD, Masters, and undergraduate students who are interested in the field of survey methodology, and making sure that these students are well-equipped to thrive in our relatively nascent field. I frequently consult with our PhD students on research ideas and topics, and these consulting meetings led to the aforementioned Measurement Error Models readings course this past semester. To date, I have served as a grader on numerous PhD qualifying exams. I have also helped one of our PhD students (Mittereder) and six of our Masters students to prepare presentations at the entirely student-run Michigan Student Symposium in Interdisciplinary Statistical Sciences (MSSISS, hosted annually at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor by graduate students of the Statistics, Biostatistics, Survey Methodology, and Electrical Engineering and Computer Science departments), of which I am the MPSM faculty advisor. I have frequently provided guidance to our graduate students who are preparing presentations for production meetings of the NSFG, the annual conference of the Midwest Association for Public Opinion Research (MAPOR), and the AAPOR annual conference. For the past six years, I have also served as the Faculty Director of the JPSM Junior Fellows program, where I provide guidance to the organizing committee and present lectures and seminars to talented undergraduate students who are interested in survey methodology and interning in the Federal Statistical System. In 2014, I hosted Jennifer Sinibaldi from the Institute for Employment Research (IAB) in Germany for three months at ISR, and Dr. Sinibaldi is now in a post-doc position at JPSM. Dr. Sinibaldi assisted me with my NIH-funded research related to interviewer observations, and I helped to guide her and discuss her research ideas while she was completing her dissertation studies. I have served as an undergraduate mentor in the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP) on three separate occasions (most recently for two undergraduate students in the 2014-2015 school year, who assisted with my NIH R03 project on interviewer observations), and I have also served on a team establishing mentor-mentee relationships for the Survey Research Methods Section of the ASA. Finally, I have written more than 40 letters of recommendation for my students to date (any of which are available upon request).

I have also been heavily involved in providing mentoring via research workshops and seminars both nationally and internationally since my SRC hiring in November of 2011. I have presented more than 50 workshops and short-courses at local, national, and international venues, and also in an online format: the University of Michigan Consulting for Statistics, Computing, and Analytics Research team (CSCAR); statistics.com (online format); the Centers for Disease Control; the Bundesbank in Frankfurt, Germany; the University of Southampton (UK); the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES); FHI360; the University of Oxford (UK); UNC-Chapel Hill; the JPSM short course series; AAPOR Webinars; and AAPOR conference short courses. I also frequently provide additional consultation to workshop participants after the workshops have concluded. I recently served as the Education Chair of the AAPOR Executive Council, where I will continue to develop short courses and webinars that will benefit the AAPOR membership and increase their technical expertise.

Finally, I have recently spent a lot of time trying to establish a formal relationship between CSCAR and MPSM, which would enable a graduate student from MPSM to help consult on questions related to survey design and applied statistics. We were able to set up such an arrangement for 2015, and this collaboration is still ongoing. I hope that this arrangement will extend far into the future, and MPSM students will be able to provide this expertise at CSCAR for years to come.

Last modified 2/12/19 by Brady T. West