Washington University’s Department of Mathematics changed its official name to the Department of Mathematics and Statistics.

The faculty decided to change the name to reflect the growth of statistics as an integral part of the mathematics department at the University.

According to Chair of the Department John McCarthy, the name officially changed last spring.

“It changed at the end of last semester. And it went through much more quickly than we expected,” McCarthy said. “We discussed it at a department meeting; we voted on it at the next department meeting; and we passed it on to the dean, who approved it.”

The name changed in accordance with an internal change in the department to show the prevalence of statistics as a whole and to illustrate the increasing number of classes and faculty.

“The number of statisticians in our department has been growing,” McCarthy said. “It’s now six out of 26. When I started a long, long time ago it was two out of 28. So, it more accurately reflects what we do and [the] huge student interest in statistics. We now have a masters and Ph.D. in statistics as well as probability and statistics, which is a popular undergraduate major track.”

Junior math major Tom Howells thinks the rise in popularity in statistics is due to its increasing employability.

“I think there’s a growing need for statistics students,” Howells said. “Stats is very employable, and it also couples up really well with things like computer science, if you’re trying to do something like data science.”

McCarthy believes the growth of statistics, in and outside of the University, has to do with the increase in the amount of data available and the development of technology that allows statisticians to work with this data.

“Because of the huge growth in our ability to collect and store data, our greatest scientific challenge for the next 50 years is how to intelligently interpret the data we gather,” McCarthy said.

Not everyone in the math department agrees with the change; some believe that it is unnecessary or that it overemphasizes statistics.

“For the most part, I think it’s superfluous, but it does differentiate pure math and applied math. Overall though, statistics is only one branch of math and shouldn’t be emphasized more than any other branch,” freshman Nick Bartochowski said.

For McCarthy, the name change not only reflects the growing relevance of statistics at Wash. U, but also demonstrates that statistics is a branch of mathematics and requires mathematical knowledge.

“Statistics is mathematical in basis, so understanding Brownian Motion, for instance, you can think of it as a problem in probability or you can think of it a problem in analysis.”

Ultimately, McCarthy believes statistics is a crucial part of the mathematics department, with growing importance in the modern world.

“We’re the fastest growing department on campus for a reason,” McCarthy said.