On-Site Research to Improve the Government-Generated Social Science Data Base

美国统计协会与美国人口普查局和美国国家科学基金会合作开展了一项具有里程碑意义的现场研究和访问研究奖学金项目。该项目成功地将主要大学院系中非常专业、资历丰富的统计学家和社会科学家带到国家第一线数据收集机构人口普查局，在那里他们从事旨在提高政府生产和传播的社会经济信息的充分性的研究。访问学者与人口普查局工作人员合作，解决处理和分析数据方面特别困难的问题。这些努力的结果正在积累成更高效和有效的机构程序，更可靠和可解释的数据产品，以及在访问科学家回到本国机构后，将更真实的世界引入他们的基础研究和教学议程。一项特殊安排允许研究员竞争继续支持该局开始的研究，这是该计划下的又一创新。除其他好处外，政府数据生产者和学术研究人员之间更自由的专业知识和知识流动正在打破定量数据在政策上有用性的障碍，并且通过增加他们的科学研究潜力，有助于摊销这个国家每年在他们的收集上所做的巨大投资。

Support is being renewed for a landmark program of on-site research and visiting research fellowships operated by the American Statistical Association in cooperation with the U.S. Bureau of the Census and the National Science Foundation. The program has been successful in bringing highly expert, well- established statisticians and social scientists on the faculties of major universities to the Census Bureau, the nation's front- line data collection agency, where they engage in research aimed at improving the adequacy of governmentally produced and disseminated socioeconomic information. Visiting fellows work with Census staff to tackle especially difficult problems in the handling and analysis of data. The results of these efforts are cumulating into more efficient and effective agency procedures, more reliable and interpretable data products, and the introduction of more real-worldliness into the basic research and teaching agenda of visiting scientists once they return to their home institutions. A special arrangement allowing fellows to compete for continued support of research begun at the Bureau represents a further innovation created under this program. Among other benefits, the freer flow of expertise and knowledge between governmental data producers and academic researchers is breaking down obstructions to the policy usefulness of quantitative data and, by increasing their scientific research potential, helping to amortize the huge annual investment this nation makes in their collection.