RSS William Guy Lecturers
The RSS William Guy Lecturers are prestigious volunteer roles intended to celebrate the importance of engaging with schools and inspiring children about statistics from an early age. They are named in honour of William Augustus Guy, an early medical statistician and past RSS president.
Three William Guy Lecturers are appointed for every academic year. Each lecturer prepares and records a talk for a particular age range. Every year we ask for talks on a particular theme.
We encourage schools to use these talks (~20-25 minutes in length) as part of their learning resources. Schools are also welcome to contact the lecturers to request in-person visits or live sessions online. We also encourage schools to contact the lecturers with questions that students may have about the talks, to enable interactive dialogue and stimulate engagement.
We hope that the William Guy Lecturer talks will be a useful and engaging resource for a broad and diverse range of schools, and will inspire students to discover the interesting and relevant applications of statistics and data science in the real world.
The current Royal Statistical Society William Guy Lecturers 2024-25
This academic year (1 August 2024– 31 July 2025), the theme is
Statistics in plain sight.
Find out more about our current William Guy Lecturers, how to contact them, and watch their talks.
- Mary Gregory, Director of Population Statistics, Office for National Statistics, London, William Guy Lecturer for ages 5–11 – From sweets to streets: Understanding the world through statistics
- Nicola Rennie, Lecturer in Health Data Science, Lancaster University, William Guy Lecturer for ages 11–16 – From lab to patient: how statistics shapes decisions in medical treatment
- Mike Campbell, Emeritus Professor of Medical Statistics, University of Sheffield, William Guy Lecturer for age 16+ – Can I really believe that number? Statistics and Covid-19
William Guy Lectureship application and appointment process
The William Guy Lecturers are appointed following an open call and competitive selection process. Further information on the application process and volunteer commitment is available on our website.
The call for applications for the William Guy Lectureship 2025-26 is now closed. The theme for the next academic year is Statistics and AI. Talks may cover a range of areas relating to how statistics underpins AI in everyday life, from entertainment platform recommendations to data handing, including topics such as bias and ethical and environmental issues. Through this theme, we seek to raise the profile and demonstrate the importance of statistics in AI.
History of the lecture
William Augustus Guy (1810-1885) was an early medical statistician and was extremely eminent in the field. He was closely associated with the Society for many years, including having been president 1873-1875. The Guy medals, awarded to distinguished statisticians for important work, testify to his memory. A more recent innovation is the William Guy Lecture.
One of our former honorary secretaries, Sidney Rosenbaum, discovered that Guy was a pupil at his old school, Christ’s Hospital. Sidney arranged discussions that led to the introduction of the Guy Lecture. The first Guy Lecture was given by Adrian Smith on 29 April 1999 – Statistics and statisticians: the good guy’s answer to lying figures and figuring liars. Adrian Bowman gave the second lecture on 19 May 2000 – A world of difference: a rough guide to why statisticians count.
Adrian Bowman’s lecture was then given to many other sixth form audiences. This encouraged us to widen the scope of the Guy Lecture to be available to any school or college.
In the past, the RSS appointed one William Guy Lecturer per year to deliver in-person talks in schools. Online engagement now offers the opportunity to reach more schools than ever before.