Our Volunteers
Our volunteers are critical to SWB's success. Learn more about them and our organization.
Who is an SWB volunteer? Can I be one?
The short answer is...yes! We welcome people for a variety of different roles. While most of our volunteers have statistical training, you don't need to have been a statistics major to help advance our mission. Among our volunteers, you will find statisticians, economists, data scientists, teachers, data analysts, medical doctors, scientists, software engineers, and students of various disciplines. Our volunteers make us who we are and without their generous commitment and contributions, we would not be able to serve our international clients and communites.
As of November 2021, we had almost 1,900 volunteers located throughout the world!
SWB volunteers take on many different roles. Our volunteers are:
- New client acquisition volunteers: Recruit new SWB clients. Watch this video to learn more.
- Project and client managers: Permanent project leads assigned to specific clients. This video has more information.
- Statistical consultants: Provide expertise and peer review as statistical subject-matter experts. Watch this video to learn more.
- Delivery and quality assurance volunteers: Ensure the project execution follows the design and plan set out by the client and the volunteers. Watch this video to learn more.
- Marketing and communications volunteers: Maintain this website, our social media presence, our internal collateral, and our external communications. This video has more info.
- Operations volunteers: Manage our technical platforms including Slack, Gmail, Google Analytics, Tendenci, and Microsoft.
- General volunteers: Responsible for completing projects and are assigned to projects that align with their skills, experience, and interests.
You might also be surprised to learn:
- Only twenty percent of our volunteers have a doctorate or the equivalent degree.
- Most of our volunteers have less than five years of experience.
- It is not a requirement to be American or to be a member of the American Statistical Association.
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How can I volunteer?
- To volunteer with SWB, please complete our volunteer application which asks about your experiences and statistics background. It should take about 15 minutes.
- Your privacy is important to us. SWB never releases any identifying information about our volunteers and only provides summary statistics (number of volunteers, country or continent, years of experience, etc.). Please see our policies, including our privacy policy, here.
- Once you submit your information, you will create a volunteer account. You can update your information there at any time.
How do I get involved with a project?
When there is a need for volunteers, SWB volunteers receive an email containing a description of the project or task, how long it is expected to last, and if any expertise or background is needed. To volunteer for a project, respond to the call for volunteers as directed.
- When a project or task is staffed, a second email announcing that the call is closed is sent to all SWB volunteers.
- When a new project is starting or when we need volunteers for one of our "permanent" volunteer teams, we will send out a call for volunteers via email.
- You must be a legal adult in your country to volunteer for a project. In the United States, this is 18 years old or older.
Project Onboarding
Non-Project Volunteer Opportunities
We also have volunteer opportunities that are not associated with a single project, or which are positions that are not directly related to running projects. Our list of currently open non-project volunteer opportunities is available here.
If you have any additional questions about volunteering, please contact us at statisticswithoutborders@gmail.com!