by Scott Evans

The Boston Marathon is the world’s oldest annual marathon and a “feel good” race. The city takes a holiday to celebrate this extraordinary cultural event and allow its residents to participate in the tradition on Patriots Monday. Runners from all over the world come to challenge and compete against themselves. Winning is not defined by where you finish among fellow runners, but by doing your best. Spectators line the streets for 26 miles and cheer for the runners at the end of the pack with as much enthusiasm as they do for the elite runners at the front of the pack. Despite extreme fatigue and dehydration, runners feed off the crowd’s energy and encouragement to push themselves to limits they may otherwise not reach.

This traditionally happy day turned tragic in April of 2013. Instead of a day of people running for a cause (e.g., raising money for medical research or to help impoverished people) as so many do, people were running for their lives due to a bombing attack near the finish line. The city and local areas had an unprecedented shut down while law enforcement searched for the people responsible for the attack. Two suspects were eventually identified; one was killed during a shoot-out with law enforcement, while the other was apprehended after a long manhunt.

Throughout the ordeal, the attitude of the city was “Boston Strong.” David Ortiz, the Boston Red Sox’s most famous player, delivered a speech in which he said, “This is our !@#$ city. And nobody is going to dictate our freedom.” The Red Sox went on to win the World Series that year.

The Boston Strong spirit lives on. The city and marathon rallied in 2014. Instead of fear reducing marathon participation, a record 35,775 runners participated.

The attack in 2013 tragically took the life of three race spectators. One of them was Lingzi Lu, a graduate student in statistics at Boston University. Lu was an ambitious, talented, and promising student with a powerful work ethic and vibrant personality. She had just passed the first part of the master’s comprehensive exam.

Boston University awarded Lu a posthumous degree at the 2013 commencement. The university also established the Lingzi Lu Scholarship Fund, which endows two scholarships for graduate students, each providing an annual stipend and full tuition for up to two years. Now, thanks to generous support from more than 1,700 people across the globe, the scholarship fund exceeds $1 million.

In addition, the Lingzi Lu Memorial Award has been created by the American Statistical Association (ASA) in partnership with the International Chinese Statistical Association (ICSA) in remembrance of Lu. Through the award, the ASA and ICSA support the studies of similarly dedicated people who are in master’s programs in statistics or who have recently earned their master’s degree in statistics. Thus, the award honors not only the memory of Lu, but also the talented statistician she would have become.