The Department of Statistics at Grand Valley State University (GVSU), the Regional Math and Science Center at GVSU, and the Michigan Council of Teachers of Mathematics are pleased to announce the 2024 Michigan Statistics Poster Competition for K-12. 

A statistics poster tells the story of a data set through numbers and graphs.  A series of four articles that explain the process used to create a statistics poster and photos of last year’s winning entries are available at the MSPC website at https://www.gvsu.edu/stat/poster.  A sample lesson plan introducing the competition, alignments of statistics posters and the standards, and videos of the winning posters are available as well.  There are also pictures and videos of past winning posters on the site for your inspiration.  All students in K through 12 residing in Michigan are eligible to submit statistics posters to the competition.

Entries will be judged in four different grade level categories: K-3, 4-6, 7-9, and 10-12. Students may work individually or in teams. For the K-3 category, there is no restriction on the size of the team; it may be as large as the entire class. For the other three categories, the team may have up to four students.

There is no entry fee. All posters must be registered through the competition website https://www.gvsu.edu/stat/poster any time before they are submitted.  There are two options for submitting the posters: either physical or electronic. “Physical” means mailing or dropping off the actual paper poster and “electronic” means uploading a file (either a high-quality picture of a paper poster or a digitally created poster) to the online registration system.  Guidelines for making a digital poster can also be found on the competition website.

The deadline is March 29, 2024, and prize winners will be notified by May 6, 2024.  First, second, and third place prizes in the amounts of $144, $96, and $72, respectively, will be awarded in each of the grade level categories, and winning entrants' schools will receive plaques signifying the honor. Honorable mention certificates will be awarded, as well.  All posters become the property of the Department of Statistics at GVSU.  Winning posters are also sent to the national competition hosted by the American Statistical Association, where they are eligible to win further prizes.

For more information, please contact event organizer Dan Adrian at [email protected].

2023 Michigan winners announced

There were 118 entries in the 2023 Michigan Statistics Poster Competition for K-12 students, including both electronic (computer files) and actual paper posters.  Entries were judged in four grade level categories: K-3, 4-6, 7-9, and 10-12.  Students were permitted to work in groups of up to 4 members except for the K-3 category where an entire class can work together on a poster. 

The first place posters in each grade category are:

In addition, two posters from Michigan won awards at the national competition!  Our K-3 winner in the Michigan competition (Olivia Ly, Amelia Herlein, Jackson Farrar; Explorer Elementary School: "What can we learn about how students take care of their bodies?") won first place in the grades K-3 national competition!  These students received $300, a certificate, and grade-appropriate graphing calculators provided by Texas Instruments. The top 5 posters and honorable mentions in each category are listed at the poster competition website https://www.gvsu.edu/stat/poster.  Photos and videos of the top 5 posters in each category are also displayed there.  The videos pan and zoom around the posters and are set to fun music.

The first, second, and third place posters receive cash prizes of $72, $48, and $36, respectively, divided equally if students worked together.  The top three entrants’ schools receive plaques signifying the honor as well.  The top 5 posters in each category qualify for the national competition, sponsored by the American Statistical Association, whose judging will be complete by the end of June.  All students who worked on a top-5 or honorable mention poster will receive certificates. 

Michigan posters win at national

In addition, our K-3 fourth place poster in the Michigan competition (Sage Sallese, Amar Podrug, Kenay Muniz-Perez; Explorer Elementary School; "What can we learn about students' cultures?") received an honorable mention at the national competition. 

The poster competition committee wishes to express its thanks to the many teachers around the state that participated in this year’s competition.  We look forward to seeing your students’ fantastic ideas put on posterboard again next year.

The competition is sponsored by the Regional Math and Science Center and the Department of Statistics at GVSU.