Welcome to the second online “issue” of Liaison!  Adjustments to the new format are still being made, but you can expect that issues will be published more often than the old newsletter.  

During the transition, Public Relations Officer Dave Campbell will be managing the newsletter.  We hope to have settled into a routine by early 2018, with issues coming as often as once a month.

July 1 saw membership changes on the executive, board and committees changed. On the Executive, Brian Allen concluded his term as past-president, Jack Gambino moved from president to past-president, Robert Platt became president-elect, and Edward Chen and Changbao Wu began their second 3-year terms as Treasurer and Meetings Coordinator.  Brian’s experience and wise advice will be missed, and I look forward to drawing on Jack’s experience as President.  Welcome, Robert, to the Executive, and welcome back, Changbao and Edward! Thank you to retiring Board members Andrea Benedetti, Anne-Sophie Charest, Joseph Beyene, Xin Gao and Katherine Davies, and welcome new and returning Board members. See elsewhere in this issue for a full report of election results.  

As I type this, committee appointments are all but complete. There are 31 different SSC committees that serve the SSC in diverse and important ways. My open call for volunteers to serve on committees generated an overwhelming response.  I am grateful to the many members who were willing to join committees.

Our annual meeting and student conference in Winnipeg was very successful, with almost 500 participants. Our local arrangements committee, led by the very capable and gracious host Alexandre Leblanc, made sure that our stay was enjoyable. We were also able to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the University of Manitoba’s Department of Statistics. The scientific program was diverse and interesting, thanks to program chair Erica Moodie. The 5th annual student conference was the largest yet, and by all accounts a great success.  Behind the scenes, a completely new web-based system was developed to manage all aspects of the program, thanks to Jason Leoppky, the Electronic Services Development Committee, and Transformative Design, our web developer.

Our 2018 meeting will be in Montréal from June 3-6, hosted by McGill University, with local arrangements co-chairs Russ Steele and Andrea Benedetti, and program chair Matias Salibian-Barrera.  

This year’s Joint Statistical meetings were held in Baltimore, with many SSC members in attendance. Wesley Yung represented the SSC on the program committee, and a small army of volunteers helped staff the SSC booth. It was great to see friends of the SSC at our JSM reception. In 2018 there are more than the usual number of Canadian connections for the JSM: Vancouver will host the meeting, Christian Léger is the program chair, and Wenqing He will represent the SSC on the program committee.

I look forward to serving the society over the coming year!

Hugh Chipman