The Statistical Society offers accreditation for statisticians to indicate to the non-statistical community that the holder has achieved an acceptable level of professional competence in the understanding and application of statistical methods.

For recent graduates and early career statisticians there is a special accreditation category called Graduate Statistician (GStat), aimed at relatively inexperienced but qualified statisticians who want some recognition to support their professional endeavours. The GStat qualification is intended primarily to indicate that the holder has recently completed a course of study equivalent to a degree course with a Major in Statistics, including Graduate Diplomas.

The current process for accreditation as a GStat is based on an educational criterion only, provided that no more than eight years have elapsed since the award of the degree or equivalent on which the application is based. The educational requirements are:

1. A pass degree from an Australian university, or equivalent qualification.

2. A minimum of 25% of a year's study in Statistics in total at second year level, and a minimum of 50% of a year's study in Statistics at third year level.

3. The applicant holds a four year Honours degree in Statistics, or the applicant has achieved a minimum average grade of 65% (that is, a credit average or equivalent) in their Statistical major at third year level or in the Statistics postgraduate coursework in the degree that forms the basis of their application.

4. Units involving statistical inference, data analysis, statistical communication skills and the use of a statistical package.

5. Several units covering material from the following list: probability and distribution theory, linear models, design of experiments, sampling methods, multivariate analysis, analysis of categorical data, time series, survival analysis, statistical consulting, statistical graphics, databases.

Applicants who have completed programs that have been assessed by the Statistical Society of Australia as meeting the breadth requirements for GStat status will only need to verify that they have satisfied criterion 3.

The application fee for GStat accreditation application is $75 and there is no ongoing annual accreditation fee. However, applicants must be members of the SSA and the accreditation status ends when the membership lapses.

If you work in an academic environment, the Statistical Society would be very grateful if you could make this information available to your students. We believe that proof of GStat accreditation may be the one difference to other qualified, non-accredited candidates that may land your students or graduates “that” job.

More information about our accreditation program, including information on how your university could obtain accreditation status, can be found here.

Please do not hesitate to contact me, if you have any questions.

Yours sincerely
Lynne Giles
Chair Accreditation Committee