Javier Rojo, Ph.D., has been appointed Professor and Dean's Eminent Scholar in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington. Dr. Rojo was previously Korvis Professor of Statistics and Director of Research for Undergraduates Summer Institute of Statistics at Oregon State University in Corvallis.
"I am thrilled and elated to be joining a great institution and a great department," says Dr. Rojo. "The faculty are fantastic, and with the continued leadership of Dean Allison and the new department leadership of Dr. Landsittel, coupled with the advent of the Ph.D. program in Biostatistics, the future of the department is indeed bright."
Dr. Rojo earned his Ph.D. in Statistics from the University of California, Berkley in 1984 and M.S. degrees in Mathematics from the University of Texas at El Paso and in Statistics from Stanford University. He currently serves as an Adjunct Professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering at Rice University and at the MD Anderson Cancer Center at the University of Texas. He is an elected Fellow of the American Statistical Association (ASA), Institute of Mathematical Statistics (IMS), Royal Statistical Society, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science and is an elected member of the International Statistical Institute. He received the ASA 2010 Don Owen Award and the 2018 Dr. Etta Z. Falconer Award for Mentoring and Commitment to Diversity in recognition of his "outstanding contributions to diversifying the landscape of the mathematical and statistical sciences through excellence, mentorship and leadership." In 2020, he was honored with the SACNAS Distinguished Scientist Award for "significant contributions to his field and his long-standing commitment to diversity and inclusion in STEM."
"Bringing Javier Rojo on board is a wonderful boon for our school. Three of our most cherished goals and values are academic and scholarly excellence, diversity and inclusion, and the joyous comradely interactions around the beauty and wonder of science and learning. To have someone of Javier's accomplishments to the point of his being nationally recognized with multiple awards for his achievements in all three of those domains is a great gift to our school, and we are so looking forward to welcoming him to our community of scholars," noted School of Public Health-Bloomington Dean David B. Allison.
Prior to joining Oregon State University, Dr. Rojo was the Seneca C. and Mary B. Weeks Endowed Chair of Statistics for the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at the University of Nevada at Reno. He has served as an Adjunct Professor of Statistics at the Centro de Investigación en Matemáticas in Guanajuato, México, as Program Director for Statistics and Probability at the National Science Foundation, and as Founding Director of the BioStatistical Laboratory at the University of Texas at El Paso. In 2019, he was appointed to the Editorial Board of the Journal of Statistical Theory and Practice. Before he began his career in statistics, Dr. Rojo was rookie of the year for a semi-pro baseball league in Juárez, México and was selected to represent México in the Pan-American games in Cali, Colombia.
"Dr. Javier Rojo comes to the School of Public Health Indiana University with a long and distinguished record of publications, professional service, and leadership," says Dr. Douglas Landsittel, incoming Chair of the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics. "As the recipient of the prestigious Don Owen Award, Fellow of the American Statistical Association and Institute of Mathematical Statistics, and a former Endowed Chair and Department Chair, Dr. Rojo will bring considerable recognition and skills to the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, which will be especially critical to the department's growth as we begin a newly established Ph.D. Program in Biostatistics."
"We're excited to have Dr. Rojo join the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics," says Dr. Michael Hendryx, Interim Chair of the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and Professor in the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health. "The department is gaining an experienced scholar with a passion for providing undergraduate research experience in statistics to women and underrepresented minority students."
Dr. Rojo will join the department on September 1, 2021.