Veronika Ročková (born 1985) is a Bayesian statistician. Born in

Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland beca ...

, and educated in the Czech Republic, Belgium, and the Netherlands, she works in the US as a professor of econometrics and statistics and James S. Kemper Faculty Scholar at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

. Her research studies methods including variable selection, high-dimensional inference, non-convex optimization, likelihood-free inference, and the spike-and-slab LASSO, and also includes applications in biomedical statistics.

Education and career

Ročková was born in 1985 in

Pardubice Pardubice (; ) is a city in the Czech Republic. It has about 92,000 inhabitants. It is the capital city of the Pardubice Region and lies on the Elbe River. The historic centre is well preserved and is protected as an Cultural monument (Czech Repub ...

, Czechoslovakia, now in the Czech Republic. She studied mathematics and statistics at

Charles University Charles University (CUNI; , UK; ; ), or historically as the University of Prague (), is the largest university in the Czech Republic. It is one of the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, oldest universities in the world in conti ...

in Prague,

Hasselt University Hasselt University ( Dutch: ''Universiteit Hasselt or UHasselt'') is a public research university with campuses in Hasselt and Diepenbeek, Belgium. It has more than 7,500 students and 1,800 academic, administrative and technical staff (2023). Th ...

in Belgium, and

Erasmus University Rotterdam Erasmus University Rotterdam ( ; abbreviated as EUR) is a public research university located in Rotterdam, Netherlands. The university is named after Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus, a 15th-century Christian humanist and theologian. Erasmus M ...

in the Netherlands. She earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics from Charles University in 2007, a master's degree in biostatistics from Hasselt University in 2009, a second master's degree in mathematical statistics from Charles University in 2010, and a Ph.D. from Erasmus University in 2013. Her doctoral dissertation, ''Bayesian Variable Selection in High-dimensional Applications'', was supervised by Emmanuel Lesaffre. After postdoctoral research in the

Wharton School The Wharton School ( ) is the business school of the University of Pennsylvania, a private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia. Established in 1881 through a donation from Joseph Wharton, a co-founder of Bethlehem Steel, the Wharton ...

of the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (Penn or UPenn) is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. One of nine colonial colleges, it was chartered in 1755 through the efforts of f ...

from 2013 to 2016, she became an assistant professor in econometrics and statistics and James S. Kemper Foundation Faculty Scholar at the

in 2016. She was promoted to associate professor in 2020 and full professor in 2022.

Recognition

Ročková was the 2018 Susie Bayarri Lecturer of the

International Society for Bayesian Analysis The International Society for Bayesian Analysis (ISBA) is a society with the goal of promoting Bayesian analysis for solving problems in the sciences and government. It was formally incorporated as a not for profit corporation by economist Arnold ...

. She was awarded a

National Science Foundation CAREER Award The National Science Foundation CAREER award is the most prestigious award presented by the National Science Foundation (NSF) of the United States Federal Government to support junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through rese ...

in 2020. She was a recipient of the 2023 Emerging Leader Award and the recipient of the 2024

COPSS Presidents' Award The COPSS Presidents' Award is given annually by the Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies to a young statistician in recognition of outstanding contributions to the profession of statistics Statistics (from German language, Ger ...

of the

Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies The Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies (COPSS) comprises the presidents, past presidents and presidents-elect of the following, primarily Northern American, professional societies of statisticians: * American Statistical Association * ...

, given "for path-breaking contributions to theory and methodology at the intersection of Bayesian and frequentist Statistics in the areas of variable selection, factor models, non-parametric Bayes, tree-based and deep-learning methods, high-dimensional inference, generative methods for Bayesian computation; for exemplary service to Statistics and for generous mentorship of students and post-doctoral researchers".

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Rockova, Veronika 1985 births Living people People from Pardubice Czech statisticians Czech women scientists American statisticians American women statisticians Charles University alumni Erasmus University Rotterdam alumni University of Chicago faculty Hasselt University alumni Mathematical statisticians