Editor-Amstat Online
Position Description
[Fall 1998]

BACKGROUND
The vision of Amstat Online, the World Wide Web site of the American
Statistical Association, is to be the nation's leading site for
advancing the statistics profession, providing resources to
statisticians and users of statistics, and improving statistics
education.

Its goals are to

1. Serve the online professional needs of ASA members and prepare to
offer expanded professional services in the future.
2. Support and promote the statistical profession by providing relevant
information about statistical sciences and statistics as a profession to
students, teachers, the media, and the general public.
3. Serve as "Statistics Central" for the United States, the primary
gateway to online information about statistics or of interest to
statisticians and users of statistics.

In support of the goals, ASA appoints a "Web Editor", a volunteer
member of the community of statistics professionals who exercises
editorial control over specified portions of the Web site.  The purpose
of this document is to elaborate on the duties and authority of the Web
Editor.

STRUCTURE
Overall authority for the site resides with the ASA Program Director
for Services (PDS) who serves under the direction of the Executive
Director.  Although not involved in day to day details of Web
development and maintenance, the PDS coordinates the activities of
those who are, including ASA staff and vendors, and consults with the
policy-making bodies through the chair of the ASA Electronic
Communications (EC) Committee and the ASA Board to establish
implementation priorities for the Web site.  The PDS is the primary
staff contact for the Web Editor.

The Web Editor is appointed by the ASA Board for a four year term
following a search conducted by the EC Committee.  That committee
appoints an editor search committee including one or more members of
the EC Committee supplemented by one member each named by the Committee
on Publications and the Publications Management Committee.  The Web
Editor position parallels that of the editors of ASA journals.  In
particular, the Web Editor is included in all listings of ASA editors
and participates in meetings of the editors.

The Web Editor appoints and oversees Associate Editors for the same
term and delegates to them responsibilities for specific areas of the
Web site that might be termed "departments".  Like the Editor, the
Associate Editors are expected to be volunteer professional
statisticians.

DUTIES
Although Amstat Online will change as technology and members' needs
coevolve, one might characterize a fuzzy dichotomy of the sorts of
material that are suitable for the site into those portions requiring
the perspective of a professional statistician (the Web Editor) and
those best overseen by ASA staff.  Although the primary
responsibilities of Editor versus those of staff should be carefully
defined, there will be some arbitrariness, and much of the material on
the site would benefit from regular consultation and information
sharing between them.  A tentative distribution of primary
responsibilities follows:

A. Those current and anticipated areas of the site that are under the
authority of the Web Editor include

* Information about statistics and the profession (What is
statistics?  Career information, educational opportunities,
statistics in the media)

* Scholarly material (textbook reviews, and see "publications")

* Links and archives (links to other societies, federal
agencies, academic departments, suppliers of texts and
technology; archives of data, software, macros)

* Help desk (to respond to requests for information about
statistics)

* Publications (Journals tables of contents, abstracts,
addenda, extracts such as book reviews and selected articles;
individual article download; Proceedings online journals;
links to other society journals entry to CIS and bibliographic
search)

Some of these areas, for example a Help Desk, Links and Archives, and
Statistics in the Media, would best be managed by an Associate
Editor.

The broad area of publications will require an especially close
collaboration among the Web Editor, Journals Manager (through the PDS),
and print and online journal editors.  Although the Web Editor will
have overall authority for this "department", some elements of the
department will be managed by staff (e.g. journals tables of contents)
or an Associate Editor (e.g. bibliographic searches).

B. Those current and anticipated areas of the site that are under the
authority of the PDS include

* ASA organization and membership (ASA constitution and other
documents; Membership directory, benefits, join; Chapters,
sections, committees, officers, staff lists and links; Other
society membership list links; News, including member news)

* Member Services (Members only area; change membership
information, subscriptions, submit member news, customer
service)

* Meetings (Schedules of ASA and related societies, program
information, online registration and abstract submission)

* Continuing Education (Information, registration for ASA
continuing education opportunities; advertisements from other
providers of professional development)

* Center for Statistical Education (ASA events for teachers,
K-12 teacher resources, order online, Statistics Teacher
Newsletter, resources for undergraduate education - link to
textbook reviews, link to Journal of Statistics Education)

* Employment (Employer advertisements, members seeking
positions)

REQUIREMENTS
The Web Editor should be an established member of the community of
professional statisticians with broad knowledge of the profession.  The
editor should be sufficiently conversant with modern information
technology to know what is possible and should have the vision to see
how technology can be employed in the service of ASA members.

BUDGET
As with other editors, the ASA will negotiate with the Web Editor a
budget that depends on the Editor's local circumstances.  The budget
might include office expenses, editorial assistance, travel and
equipment.

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