H&SS News
Members of the CMU campus community form a Human Histogram of Heights in celebration of World Statistics Day.
View more photos from the event.
October 2010
Human Histogram of Heights
Have you ever wondered how the height of the CMU campus community is distributed? Well, you do not need to wonder any more. In honor of the first-ever World Statistics Day on October 20, 2010, the Statistics Department's Undergraduate Student Advisory Committee led faculty, staff and students in creating a human histogram of heights.
"We had the campus community come to the football field and report their height," said Emily Butler, a senior statistics major who led the efforts for the student advisory committee. "Based on their height, they stood on different yard lines, one-by-one, so that we could see how many people were of what height."
With over 150 participants, the heights ranged from 5'1" to 6'5".
The histogram is multi-modal corresponding to the mixture of heights due to gender.
"World Statistics Day was a wonderful opportunity for us as a university to recognize the role statistics plays in our lives," said Joel Greenhouse, professor of statistics and committee advisor. "Wherever there is data and an opportunity to learn from data, statistics plays a key role."
Currently, there are more than 150 undergraduate students majoring in statistics at Carnegie Mellon. Rebecca Nugent, an assistant teaching professor who also advised the committee, said, "Not only is statistics becoming an increasingly popular major at CMU, but students in many disciplines, including engineering, business and the sciences, are discovering the value of statistics and statistical thinking."
According to Butler, the human histogram of heights was a huge success. "We had a lot of participation and even had a GigaPan made so we could share our histogram with the world," she said.
As world spread about Carnegie Mellon's human histogram of heights, so did enthusiasm. The histogram's GigaPan was viewed more than 1,400 times in its first day online. The American Statistical Association and State of the USA organization included links to the GigaPan and media coverage on their websites. And, U.S. Census Director Robert Groves mentioned the human histogram of heights in his World Statistics Day remarks.
"It was an amazing opportunity to bring the Carnegie Mellon community together to celebrate statistics and for students to see the concepts they've learned in actions," said Butler.
Related Links:
View the GigaPan of the Human Histogram of Heights.
View photos from the event.
See the height distribution as a graph.
See how the height was distributed based on gender.
Watch a video of CMU's World Statisctics Day Celebration.
Stay connected with Carnegie Mellon's College of Humanities and Social Sciences on Twitter and Facebook.
Other
sources of Carnegie Mellon news include the university news
service website and the Carnegie
Mellon Today magazine.
Contact
Shilo Raube, Director of Public Relations at sraube@andrew.cmu.edu
or (412) 268-6094.
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