#  Favorite Professors and Harvard Statistics 

 



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 Once a year, every graduating senior at Harvard is asked to nominate his/her favorite professor (out of all courses taken over the preceding four years). The Harvard Yearbook staff tallies up all the votes, and then invites the winning professors to submit a letter to their students to appear in the yearbook. The staff selects approximately 45-50 professors each year (out of all faculty members teaching in a total of 37 undergraduate departments).

 By the way in which nominations are collected, one expects the larger departments to prevail, since smaller departments (like the Statistics Department) have fewer faculty members in the pool. This follows from the limitation that a senior can select *at most one* professor's name for consideration.



 

 Past Favorite Professors Sample Letters 

## Past Favorite Professors

 

 

 With immense pride, the Statistics Department can announce that such expectations have been disproven:

 Sort    Class of 2015 Favorite Professors 

  [**Joseph Blitzstein**](/people/joseph-k-blitzstein) and [**Michael Parzen**](/michael-parzen) 

    Class of 2014 Favorite Professors 

  [**Joseph Blitzstein**](/people/joseph-k-blitzstein) and [**Michael Parzen**](/michael-parzen) 

    Class of 2013 Favorite Professors 

  [**Joseph Blitzstein**](/people/joseph-k-blitzstein) and [**Michael Parzen**](/michael-parzen) 

    Class of 2012 Favorite Professors 

  [**Joseph Blitzstein**](/people/joseph-k-blitzstein) and [**Michael Parzen**](/michael-parzen) 

    Class of 2011 Favorite Professors 

  [**Joseph Blitzstein**](/people/joseph-k-blitzstein) and [Stephen Blyth](/stephen-blyth) 

    Class of 2010 Favorite Professor 

  [**Joseph Blitzstein**](/joseph-blitzstein) 

    Class of 2009 Favorite Professors 

  [**Joseph Blitzstein**](/people/joseph-k-blitzstein) and **Kenneth Stanley** 

  



 Joseph Blitzstein is Professor of the Practice in Statistics and teaches STAT 110 (Introduction to Probability); Michael Parzen is Senior Lecturer on Statistics and teaches STAT 104 (Introduction to Quantitative Methods for Economics); Stephen Blyth is Professor of the Practice in Statistics (Part-Time)/Managing Director (Harvard Management Company) and teaches STAT 123 (Applied Quantitative Finance on Wall Street); and Kenneth Stanley, now retired as a professor from the Harvard School of Public Health, also taught STAT 104.



 



 

 

 

## Sample Letters

 

 

 Here are sample letters from the professors to their students, starting with vol. 376 (2012) of the Harvard yearbook:

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 continuing with vol. 375 (2011) of the yearbook:

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 and ending with vol. 373 (2009) of the yearbook: