vasishth/vincentgranville.txt

## vincentgranville.txt
“He seems to have a solid stats background back in the day”

A lot of people claim a lot of things about themselves. I have met a lot of people who characterize themselves as “fluent in Japanese” (oddly, these are always Americans), where their actual on-the-ground fluency level is pretty laughable.

I couldn’t find any clear statements about what his educational background is. He says on his linkedin page: “Facultés universitaires ‘Notre-Dame de la Paix’ Ph.D., Statistics, Mathematics, Science, 1983 – 1993″, Then he lists two courses he did there, “Stochastic Geometry, Markov Processes.” I find it odd that a guy does a PhD somewhere, over 10 years, and lists two courses under that PhD.

Also, I searched for this mysterious uni I have never heard of: Facultés universitaires ‘Notre-Dame de la Paix.

I ended up at a weird Jesuits page in Belgium:

http://www.jesuites.be/Facultes-universitaires-Notre-Dame.html

They describe themselves as companions of Jesus. Further research reveals that the relevant university is the University of Namur, located in Namur, the capital of Wallonia. Huh? I have never heard of this university. Wikipedia enlightens:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universit%C3%A9_de_Namur

So what is this “Facultés universitaires ‘Notre-Dame de la Paix”? It is not listed under this university. Further study of the wikipedia page shows that this refers to one of those interminable and inscrutably French-style mergers and demergers of a bunch of universities, and it will be dissolved in 2014 (I did say interminable).

So he says he’s got a PhD in Statistics, Mathematics, but the Uni of Namur doesn’t even have a Statistics or Mathematics department. So how did this PhD come about? I want to see the PhD dissertation.

Similarly, he says he did a “Post doctorate, Statistics 1995 – 1996, Cambridge University” (I have never heard the phrase “post doctorate” before, it sounds like a phrase someone would use who is not from academia), and then lists four courses he did there: “Time Series Modeling, Markov Chain Monte Carlo, Hierarchical Bayesian Models, Stochastic Point Processes”. Do postdocs list the courses they did while being a postdoc?

Also, I doubt that Cambridge would hire a guy as a postdoc coming from whatever this FUNDP thing is. Isn’t there any Cambridge statistician reading this blog? Can someone check if he really did do a postdoc there?

So what does this mean? He did six courses overall. Of course, it doesn’t really matter how many courses a person did, but as far as his claimed academic credentials are concerned, I’m very suspicious of such a “cv”. If I were looking at such a cv from the perspective of hiring a statistician with a PhD, it would go straight into the garbage heap.

My bullshit filters are all blinking red.
	“He seems to have a solid stats background back in the day”

	A lot of people claim a lot of things about themselves. I have met a lot of people who characterize themselves as “fluent in Japanese” (oddly, these are always Americans), where their actual on-the-ground fluency level is pretty laughable.

	I couldn’t find any clear statements about what his educational background is. He says on his linkedin page: “Facultés universitaires ‘Notre-Dame de la Paix’ Ph.D., Statistics, Mathematics, Science, 1983 – 1993″, Then he lists two courses he did there, “Stochastic Geometry, Markov Processes.” I find it odd that a guy does a PhD somewhere, over 10 years, and lists two courses under that PhD.

	Also, I searched for this mysterious uni I have never heard of: Facultés universitaires ‘Notre-Dame de la Paix.

	I ended up at a weird Jesuits page in Belgium:

	http://www.jesuites.be/Facultes-universitaires-Notre-Dame.html

	They describe themselves as companions of Jesus. Further research reveals that the relevant university is the University of Namur, located in Namur, the capital of Wallonia. Huh? I have never heard of this university. Wikipedia enlightens:

	http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universit%C3%A9_de_Namur

	So what is this “Facultés universitaires ‘Notre-Dame de la Paix”? It is not listed under this university. Further study of the wikipedia page shows that this refers to one of those interminable and inscrutably French-style mergers and demergers of a bunch of universities, and it will be dissolved in 2014 (I did say interminable).

	So he says he’s got a PhD in Statistics, Mathematics, but the Uni of Namur doesn’t even have a Statistics or Mathematics department. So how did this PhD come about? I want to see the PhD dissertation.

	Similarly, he says he did a “Post doctorate, Statistics 1995 – 1996, Cambridge University” (I have never heard the phrase “post doctorate” before, it sounds like a phrase someone would use who is not from academia), and then lists four courses he did there: “Time Series Modeling, Markov Chain Monte Carlo, Hierarchical Bayesian Models, Stochastic Point Processes”. Do postdocs list the courses they did while being a postdoc?

	Also, I doubt that Cambridge would hire a guy as a postdoc coming from whatever this FUNDP thing is. Isn’t there any Cambridge statistician reading this blog? Can someone check if he really did do a postdoc there?

	So what does this mean? He did six courses overall. Of course, it doesn’t really matter how many courses a person did, but as far as his claimed academic credentials are concerned, I’m very suspicious of such a “cv”. If I were looking at such a cv from the perspective of hiring a statistician with a PhD, it would go straight into the garbage heap.

	My bullshit filters are all blinking red.