NC State’s Pantula Elected President of American Statistical Association

North Carolina State University statistician Dr. Sastry Pantula has been elected as the 105th president of the American Statistical Association (ASA). Pantula, who is the head of the NC State Department of Statistics and director of the Institute of Statistics, will serve as ASA president beginning Jan. 1, 2010. The ASA is a scientific and educational society founded in 1839, with 18,000 members serving in academia, government, and industry.

A 2002 Fellow of the ASA, Pantula received the Young Statistician Award from the International Indian Statistical Association in 2002 and the D.D. Mason Faculty Award in 2001. He is a member of the NCSU Academy of Outstanding Teachers, Phi Kappa Phi, Sigma Xi, Gamma Sigma Delta and Mu Sigma Rho.

Pantula received his Ph.D. in statistics from Iowa State University, and master’s and bachelor’s degrees in statistics from the Indian Statistical Institute in Calcutta, India. He became the statistics department head at NC State in 2002, after serving the university as assistant department head, director of graduate programs and professor of statistics.

“Statistics is the backbone of scientific research,” Pantula said. “ASA, in collaboration with many other international associations and institutes, now has tremendous potential to advance science and guide public policy. The diversity of our membership and the cross-sectoral relationships among our members in academia, business, government and industry provide a unique talent pool to address global problems related to health, environment and resources. I am excited and humbled by this opportunity to serve ASA at this pivotal time.”