Biostatistics Practicum

2026-04-23 19:06 PDT

Source repository for the open-access graduate textbook Biostatistics Practicum. The book covers the practical workflow that surrounds statistical modelling: reproducibility, Git, Docker, Quarto reporting, tidyverse data wrangling, and clinical-trial case studies. It fills the practical-skills gap that most graduate statistical training leaves open; Jenny Bryan's STAT 545 (Bryan 2019) at UBC is the pedagogical model.

• Live site: https://rgtlab.org/practicum
• License: CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 (see LICENSE.md)
• Format: Quarto book (HTML + PDF)
• Template: Follows Posit/Hadley book conventions (Advanced R, R for Data Science, R Packages).

Local build

Prerequisites: Quarto 1.5+ and R 4.4+.

make deps       # install R package dependencies
make render     # render HTML + PDF to _book/
make preview    # live preview at http://localhost:4200

Content sources

Chapter outlines are derived from three sources:

1. Author's graduate practicum lecture materials (speaker notes, slides, supporting scripts). These provide the pedagogical spine: reproducibility, federal requirements, Git, SAPs, workspace setup, testing, and case studies.
2. Working blog posts at ~/prj/qblog/posts/, drawn from real analyses and workstation setup notes. These contribute practical 'how I actually do it' content layered on the pedagogical material.
3. Stat 545 (Jenny Bryan, UBC) for the philosophical framing and the Quarto + wrangling supplementary material.

Deploying to rgtlab.org/practicum

Recommended pattern: deploy to its own Netlify site (practicum.netlify.app) and add a path-based redirect from the main rgtlab.org site:

/practicum/*  https://practicum.netlify.app/:splat  200

Relationship to the sibling book

This book is a companion to Statistical Computing in the Age of AI (at ~/Dropbox/prj/tch/01-phb228-stat-computing/phb228-2026/textbook/), which covers the statistical modelling and inference that this book explicitly excludes. The two books share audience, style, and the Prereq/Quiz-answers pedagogy.

Open source questions

• Chapter 18 (CDISC): authored from a draft originally at ~/Dropbox/prj/tch/01-phb228-stat-computing/phb228-2026/textbook/19-cdisc.qmd (now deleted; canonical copy lives only here with anchor IDs renumbered 19 → 18).