Scope of assistance provided
We provide assistance in all statistical aspects of research, including: project development, grant writing, experimental design, data analysis, software use (including SAS and R), interpretation of results, writing of reports, manuscripts and presentations, and addressing reviewer comments.
Co-authorship and acknowledgement in publications
Given our collaborative philosophy by which you perform all or a substantive part of the analyses, you “own” the work and in most cases, we would appreciate recognition of the statistician’s contribution in the form of a formal acknowledgement in resulting publications. We ask that this acknowledgment include the name of our group, for example as:
“We thank [name of statistician] from the Statistical Consulting group at the University of Wisconsin – Madison for assistance in the [design/analysis/visualization] of [project/section/experiment].”
If the statistician had significant input into the design of the study, performed the analyses themselves rather than guiding you how to do them, or designed new methodology for the project, then co-authorship may be warranted and could be discussed.
Eligibility
Schools or Colleges, Departments or Centers, or individual labs can collaborate with us by setting up a fee agreement. These are generally longer term (at least one year) agreements.
Currently, eligible researchers include UW faculty, staff, and students in the following units:
- All departments and centers in the College of Agricultural and Life Sciences
- The departments of Botany, of Geography and of Integrative Biology in the College of Letters & Science
- The department of Medical Sciences in the School of Veterinary Medicine
- The Wisconsin National Primate Research Center
- Several individual labs across campus
Students with a major advisor in any of these units are also eligible.
Please don’t hesitate to contact us if your unit is interested in discussing an agreement with us, or if you are interested in collaborating with us but are unsure about your eligibility.
Requesting a meeting
If you are part of a current agreement, you can enter the waiting list to meet with one of our statisticians by filling out our online Signup Form. The description of your request is very important, as it will help our staff connect you to the statistician who is best able to meet your specific needs. We do not offer drop-in consulting.
Process time frame
You will receive immediate confirmation of a successful request submission. Within 2-3 business days of submission, you will get confirmation from the staff that you have been assigned to a statistician. You should then be contacted by that statistician within another 2-3 business days to set up an initial appointment. Depending on the time of year, it may be up to 2-3 weeks from the time of submission to the first actual meeting with the statistician. Please plan ahead and contact us well in advance! In addition, be aware that even relatively simple questions can take at least 2-4 meetings spread over 1-2 months to completely and adequately address.
Fair usage practices
We ask that you work with only one statistician at a time on any given project. If you are working on several distinct projects, you may request a different statistician for each project, or the same statistician for any or all of them. If you feel that the help you are receiving is unsatisfactory, we suggest that you discuss the situation with your statistician first. If this does not resolve the problem, contact the director, Cecile Ane (cecile.ane@wisc.edu) or manager, Nick Keuler (nskeuler@wisc.edu). We ask that you not re-enter the waiting list in such a situation.