An Introduction to Small Area Estimation by Dr. Carolina Franco

Along with ASA's Committee on International Relations in Statistics, SWB invites you to join us for a webinar entitled "An Introduction to Small Area Estimation" by Dr. Carolina Franco, Principal Statistician at NORC at the University of Chicago. 

Day and time: May 11, 2022, from 12:00-1:30 p.m. ET

Link to register: https://amstat.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZEtfuCvrTMrGNcni1WtC8e6p12fvEby5ty2 

About the event: Small area estimation (SAE) techniques can lead to greatly improved estimates relative to direct survey estimates when there is a large number of domains of interest and limited overall sample size, which is often the case in surveys. When successfully applied, SAE can dramatically reduce measures of uncertainty and provide estimates for domains with no survey data. It can allow for the publishing of official estimates at lower levels of aggregation.

We will discuss the following topics:

• What is small area estimation (SAE)?
• What are the potential benefits of SAE?
• Examples of real applications of small area estimation
• An introduction to area-level and unit-level models
• Discussion of frequently used software
• Where to learn more…

About the speaker: Dr. Carolina Franco is a Principal Statistician at NORC at the University of Chicago, specializing in small area estimation (SAE). Prior to moving to NORC last year, Dr. Franco spent many several years doing research and consulting at the US Census Bureau, where she worked on important SAE programs used in the production of official statistics, including the Small Area Income and Poverty Estimates (SAIPE)
program and the Voting Rights Act, Section 203 determinations. For the latter, she led the model
development of the 2021 determinations. She also has extensive experience giving seminars on SAE
and has taught SAE through the Joint Program in Survey Methodology at the University of Maryland. She has published several papers on different aspects of SAE.