Hello,
We have two new items of news (apologies for any cross posting)
1) MLwiN 2.16 release
2) 'The limitations of using school league tables to inform school choice'
- and a reminder about our studentship -
3) ESRC +3 PhD Studentship in Social Statistics. Closing date 16th
December 2009.
1) MLwiN 2.16 release: The Centre for Multilevel Modelling would like to
announce the release of MLwiN 2.16.
Some bugs have been fixed, e.g. preserving whether a term is in the fixed
part when loading old worksheets
We have also now updated our MLwiN 30-day trial version. Please go to
MLwiN: http://www.cmm.bristol.ac.uk/MLwiN/index.shtml
MLwiN latest bug fixes:
http://www.cmm.bristol.ac.uk/MLwiN/bugs/fixes.shtml
2) The Centre for Multilevel Modelling's George Leckie and Harvey Goldstein
have had a paper published in the Journal of the Royal Statistical Society:
Series A, 172(4), 835-851, '172, Part 4, pp. 835-851, 'The limitations of
using school league tables to inform school choice'.
Each year, the government publishes league tables of GCSE results to help
parents choose their children’s secondary school. But as George Leckie and
Harvey Goldstein explain, the past performance of schools is an imprecise
guide to how they might perform in the future.
Speaking about the findings, George Leckie said:
"Parents need to be aware that the tables contain less information than
official sources imply and that this necessitates a lower weight being
placed on them as compared with other sources of information available to
parents. It is also worth noting that Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland
have either never had or have abandoned publishing school league tables.
Now seems a good time for England to follow suit."
For further details go to the Journal of the Royal Statistical Society:
Series A, 172(4), 835-851:
http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/fulltext/122420203/PDFSTART?CRE
TRY=1&SRETRY=0
3) Applications are invited to the post of ESRC +3 PhD Studentship in
Social Statistics. Closing date 16th December 2009.
This studentship will be linked to an ESRC-funded project, LEMMA II. The
LEMMA project is developing generic statistical multilevel modelling
methodology for complex modelling across a range of applications in the
social sciences. Estimation algorithms for the models are being developed
using MCMC techniques. The topic of the PhD could be in the areas of
statistical methodology development or application of methodology developed
by the team to substantive problems or a mixture of both.
Further details:
http://www.cmm.bristol.ac.uk/team/LEMMA-PhD-Nov-09.pdf
With best wishes,
Hilary Browne
Technical and Business Manager
Centre for Multilevel Modelling
University of Bristol
2 Priory Road
Bristol BS8 1TX
Tel: +44 (0)117 331 0847
Web: http://www.cmm.bristol.ac.uk
|