“Friday Before Pi Day,” a Pi Day Celebration

This event is being postponed based on NIH Guidance for Staff on Coronavirus:

• In support of the Office of Personnel Management guidance to strengthen our efforts to protect the federal workforce to ensure continuity of operations, NIH is urging staff to limit work-related attendance at large meetings to those that are mission critical.
• Please check with your supervisor to help determine the necessity of your work-related meeting attendance and travel based on this guidance.
• NIH also is urging that all large meetings and symposia that are not mission critical and are scheduled to be held at NIH facilities or organized by NIH over the next 30 days (beginning on March 9, 2020) either be held virtually using tele/videoconferencing services, postponed, or canceled.
• In the coming weeks, NIH will evaluate this guidance for work-related travel and meetings that take place beyond the 30-day period and provide updated guidance.

The Office of Data Science Strategy is hosting “Friday Before Pi Day,” a Friday-the-13^th inspired Pi Day celebration on Friday, March 13, in Building 35 (Porter) beginning at 9 a.m., to celebrate the wonder of Pi and highlight the role of data science and mathematics fields in biomedical research.

The day’s activities will feature a keynote lecture from data scientist Rebecca Nugent, Ph.D., an award-winning professor of statistics and data science at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), where she holds the Stephen E. and Joyce Fienberg Professorship in Statistics & Data Science and is the Associate Department Head and Co-Director of Undergraduate Studies for the Statistics & Data Science Department at CMU. Dr. Nugent’s keynote will focus on how data science is the “science of the people” and how data can be harnessed by everyone.

Dr. Nugent is a past recipient of the American Statistical Association’s Waller Education Award, a national award for innovation in statistics education. She is also a past chair of the Women in Data Science Conference at CMU.

Events held from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. will be videocast; a link will be available closer to the event.

Below is the full agenda:

9 a.m.                          Welcome Remarks

9:15 a.m.                     Scary Data Stories…and How You Can Avoid Your Own (session 1)

Join us to hear NIH employees share their data-related horror stories and offer advice on how to avoid becoming the subject of a “tall tale.”

10:15 a.m.                   Break

10:30 a.m.                   Keynote Presentation, Dr. Rebecca Nugent

11:30 a.m.                   Trivia sign-up and lunch

Celebrate Pi Day with a slice of pie at any of the cafeterias on main campus. Select locations will also have Pi Day pizza specials.  

12:15 p.m.                   Pi Day Trivia

Join us for Pi Day trivia while you eat lunch at Building 35!

1:15 p.m.                     Break

1:30 p.m.                     Scary Data Stories…and How You Can Avoid Your Own (session 2)

Join us to hear NIH employees share their data-related horror stories and offer advice on how to avoid becoming the subject of a “tall tale.”

2 p.m.                          Pi-tionary: 3:14-minute Illustrated Lightning Talks

Come vote for your favorite Pi Day Pictionary contestant! Offices and labs will give 3:14-minute talks about their work while drawing the content of their talk. Speakers will be judged for incorporating Pi, having a “scary” factor, and using lay terms. The winning team will be awarded a full-size pie.

2:50 p.m.                     Closing Remarks

If you have any questions about “Friday Before Pi Day,” please contact datascience@nih.gov.

The Office of Data Science Strategy is hosting this event in close collaboration with members of OD, NLM, CIT, NIAID, NCI.