[bjackman]

I have actually been thinking of hiring some training contractors to come in and teach people the basics of applied statistical inference. I think with a bit of internal selling, engineers would generally be interested enough to show up and pay attention. And I don't think we need very deep expertise, just a moderate bump in the ambient level of statistical awareness would probably go a long way.

It's not like there's a shortage of skills in this area, it seems like our one specific industry just has a weird blindspot.

[stogot]

Don’t most computer science programs require this? Mine had a statistics requirement

[Al-Khwarizmi]

I don't know how it is in the US and other countries, but in my country I would say statistics is typically not taught well, at least in CS degrees. I was a very good student, always had good understanding at the subjects at university, but in the case of statistics they just taught us formulae and techniques as dogmas without much explanation of where they came from, why, and when to use them. It didn't help either that the exercises we did always applied them to things outside CS (clinical testing, people's heights and things like that) with no application we could directly relate to. As a result, when I finished the degree I had forgotten most of it, and when I started working I was surprised that it was actually useful.

When I talk about this with other CS people in my own country (Spain) they tend to refer similar experiences.

[grugagag]

I had the same experience in the US