CBHDS Takes Boston: Highlights from ACTStat and JSM 2026

The CBHDS team was excited to join the statistical community in Boston this August for the 2026 Joint Statistical Meetings (JSM), held August 2–6. The annual meeting brought together statisticians, data scientists, educators, and researchers from across the country to share new methodological work, discuss emerging issues in the field, and strengthen connections across the statistical community.

JSM was preceded by the Association of Clinical and Translational Statisticians (ACTStat) Annual Meeting, held August 1–2. The meeting closed with Professional Development for Collaborative Statisticians in the Age of AI, a session sponsored by the Quantitative Staff Network (QSN) and organized by CBHDS Director Alexandra Hanlon and Mary Sammel, Associate Director of the Center for Innovative Design & Analysis (CIDA) at the University of Colorado Anschutz. The session examined how artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping the work of collaborative statisticians and how these tools can be used effectively while preserving the scientific judgment, communication, and collaboration that remain central to the field.

CBHDS Assistant Director Alicia Lozano opened the session with The Human in the Loop: Evolving Roles for Collaborative Statisticians in an AI-Driven World, examining how AI is reshaping traditional statistical tasks and why critical thinking, scientific reasoning, communication, and collaboration may become even more important as these tools are integrated into statistical practice. Marcus Waldman from the University of Colorado Anschutz followed with Working Effectively with AI, introducing practical frameworks for interacting with AI tools in a more deliberate and effective way. Tony Mangino of the University of Kentucky closed the presentations with Help! The AI Cleaned My Data, demonstrating how these frameworks can be applied to real-world workflows involving data quality, wrangling, and analysis.

The session generated considerable enthusiasm and discussion and was very well received as the closing session of the ACTStat meeting. Building on that momentum, the group is exploring opportunities to continue developing this work through future QSN seminar programming and potentially as a traveling course through the American Statistical Association (ASA).

During JSM, Hanlon also helped organize the Section on Statistical Consulting roundtable Implementing Role-Play in Statistical Courses, led by Mario Davidson from Vanderbilt University. The discussion focused on role-play as an active-learning strategy for strengthening communication, teamwork, leadership, ethical decision-making, and collaboration with domain experts.

CBHDS Research Scientist Chris Grubb also contributed to the JSM program in multiple ways. He presented Posterior Sampling of Synthetic Populations via Multiple Imputation during the session Advances in Bayesian Inference and Theory, highlighting a posterior-based approach that allows uncertainty in synthetic population generation to be propagated into downstream simulation analyses. Grubb also served as a moderator for a separate session on Bayesian Analysis of Latent Structures, helping facilitate discussion around emerging Bayesian methods and applications.

The meeting also included a special recognition for CBHDS. Hanlon was one of three recipients of the 2026 ASA Founders Award, one of the association’s highest honors recognizing distinguished and sustained service to the ASA. Her continued leadership within the association was also evident throughout JSM. As Chair of the ASA Development Committee, Hanlon participated in committee meetings focused on advancing the ASA’s educational, scientific, and outreach priorities and strengthening support for initiatives across the association.

Beyond the scientific program, JSM and ACTStat provided valuable opportunities to reconnect and socialize with colleagues in collaborative statistics and data science from across the country. Following the close of ACTStat and the first day of JSM on August 2, the team also joined colleagues at a Virginia Tech Department of Statistics mixer, providing another opportunity to connect with the broader Virginia Tech statistics community. Together, the week offered a meaningful combination of scientific exchange, professional development, collaboration, and celebration.