November 28, 2016
Stat of the Week Competition: November 26 – December 2 2016
Each week, we would like to invite readers of Stats Chat to submit nominations for our Stat of the Week competition and be in with the chance to win an iTunes voucher.
Here’s how it works:
- Anyone may add a comment on this post to nominate their Stat of the Week candidate before midday Friday December 2 2016.
- Statistics can be bad, exemplary or fascinating.
- The statistic must be in the NZ media during the period of November 26 – December 2 2016 inclusive.
- Quote the statistic, when and where it was published and tell us why it should be our Stat of the Week.
Next Monday at midday we’ll announce the winner of this week’s Stat of the Week competition, and start a new one.
The fine print:
- Judging will be conducted by the blog moderator in liaison with staff at the Department of Statistics, The University of Auckland.
- The judges’ decision will be final.
- The judges can decide not to award a prize if they do not believe a suitable statistic has been posted in the preceeding week.
- Only the first nomination of any individual example of a statistic used in the NZ media will qualify for the competition.
- Individual posts on Stats Chat are just the opinions of their authors, who can criticise anyone who they feel deserves it, but the Stat of the Week award involves the Department of Statistics more officially. For that reason, we will not award Stat of the Week for a statistic coming from anyone at the University of Auckland outside the Statistics department. You can still nominate and discuss them, but the nomination won’t be eligible for the prize.
- Employees (other than student employees) of the Statistics department at the University of Auckland are not eligible to win.
- The person posting the winning entry will receive a $20 iTunes voucher.
- The blog moderator will contact the winner via their notified email address and advise the details of the $20 iTunes voucher to that same email address.
- The competition will commence Monday 8 August 2011 and continue until cancellation is notified on the blog.
Rachel Cunliffe is the co-director of CensusAtSchool and currently consults for the Department of Statistics. Her interests include statistical literacy, social media and blogging. See all posts by Rachel Cunliffe »
Statistic: The graph of union membership by David Farrah and published by Bryce Edwards on Twitter.
The graph doesn’t start at zero so gives a misleading view of the downward slope.
It’s particularly ironic since DPF complained about the same thing in this “stat of the week” back in 2014
https://www.statschat.org.nz/2014/08/11/stat-of-the-week-competition-august-9-15-2014/
Source: Twitter
Date: 27 November, 2016
An academic should have better numeracy skills to be able to recognise a dud graph.
8 years ago
Statistic: “…New Zealand showed improvements in both subjects…” (maths and science, TIMSS 2014/15)
Source: New Zealand Herald
Date: 29 Nov 2016
The New Zealand Herald should be challenging, not providing a platform for the Minister of Education’s dubious claim that “TIMSS shows that all other average scores have not only stabilised, but increased from the previous cycle.”
The Minister’s own officials state that “Since the last cycle of TIMSS…, Year 5 and Year 9 students’ average maths scores haven’t changed.” Scores come with a margin of error; the small increases from the previous cycle of TIMSS are too small to be statistically significant. (http://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/publications/series/2571/timss-201415/what-we-know-about-maths-achievement-new-zealand-year-5-and-year-9-results-from-timss-201415)
8 years ago
Statistic: Percentage of people who say it is “essential” to live in a democracy, by birth cohort
Source: Stuff re-printed chart – original source: Yascha Mounk and Roberto Stefan Foa, “The Signs of Democratic Deconsolidation,” Journal of Democracy
Date: 1 December 2016
Other than New Zealand in red, all the other countries’ lines have been coloured ‘blue’ making it impossible to differentiate between countries in the chart.
8 years ago