Sarah Lotspeich wins esteemed Biostatistics award

Assistant Professor of Statistics Sarah Lotspeich was recently honored with the 2026 ENAR Dionne Price Early Career PIONEER Award in Biostatistics for her outstanding innovation in mentoring, loyal service to the biostatistics community, and extraordinary impact on her field. The Award honors the legacy of Dr. Dionne L. Price, a pioneering statistician, dedicated member of the Eastern North American Region (ENAR), and the first African American president of the American Statistical Association. Winners of the Award demonstrate a “PIONEER” spirit in proactive service, innovative mentoring, outstanding impact, new methodology, engagement with ENAR, excellence in communication, and research leadership. 

Lotspeich shared, “I feel like this award acknowledges the importance of so many of my favorite parts of my job, and I feel so deeply grateful that ENAR has created a space that shares my passion for these things. The fact that this award commemorates Dr. Dionne Price, a steadfast leader and glowing example of the importance of these tenets, makes me even prouder.”

Because the award encourages biostatistics professionals to invest in mentoring the next generation, Lotspeich believes it broadens the definition of “impact” by serving the community in ways that can make it better for everyone. 

Lotspeich primarily conducts and supervises student research that tackles real-world data quality challenges in electronic health records (EHRs) and health disparities research. She is the co-lead of the Spatial and Environmental Statistics in Health (SESH) Lab at Wake Forest and the Methods for INcomplete Data (MIND) Lab at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. 

Because many students don’t take Statistics until college, Lotspeich enjoys serving as an ambassador for the field at Wake Forest. She also loves bringing real-world examples from her biostatistics research and collaborations into the classroom to show students the impact that their coursework can have on the world. 

Lotspeich holds a Ph.D. in Biostatistics from Vanderbilt University, a postdoctoral fellowship in Biostatistics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and a Bachelor of Science in Statistics from the University of Florida.