Stats-Savvy Students Help Improve Community Safety in ASA Contest Analyzing Police Emergency Call Data

Statistics and public safety go hand-in-hand, as was demonstrated recently when hundreds of high-school and undergraduate students analyzed emergency response call data from metropolitan police departments in Baltimore, Cincinnati, and Seattle as part of an ASA public education contest called the Police Data Challenge. The ASA teamed up with the Police Data Initiative, a Police Foundation program that promotes the use of open data to encourage joint problem solving.

The winners are:

Best Overall Winners

• Undergraduate: Jimmy Hickey, Kapil Khanal, and Luke Peacock - Winona State University (Sponsored by Silas Bergen)
• High School: Catalina Bartholomew, Sophie Mason, Grace Ding, and Allie Restani - Valley Christian High School, San Jose, California (Sponsored by Claudia Smith)

Best Visualization Winners

• Undergraduate: Julia Nguyen, Katherine Qian, Youbeen Shim, and Catherine Sun - University of Virginia (Sponsored by Jordan Rodu)
• High School: Alex Lapuente, Ana Kenefick, and Sara Kenefick - Charlotte Latin School, Charlotte, North Carolina (Sponsored by Donna Minnig)

Best Use of External Data Winners

• Undergraduate: Luke Zheng, Qianyu Liu, Scott Lai, Sicheng Chu, and Xi He - University of Wisconsin (Sponsored by Karl Rohe)
• High School: Alaina Cerro, Sean Conroy, and Elise Bermudez - Bethel Park High School, Bethel Park, Pennsylvania (Sponsored by Lee Cristofano)

“On behalf of the American Statistical Association, congratulations to the Police Data Challenge winners for their impressive recommendations for improving safety through statistics,” said Ron Wasserstein, the ASA’s executive director. “The entries showed the immense level of passion students have nationwide for applying statistics to important initiatives, demonstrating that statistics is a powerful resource for change.”