Associate Professor Leanne Scott

Associate Professor

Office: 

PD Hahn 5.66

Research Interests: 

Operations Research, Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis, Problem Structuring, Public Sector Decision Making, Systemic Approaches to Unpacking Complex Societal Problems

Courses Taught

  • Introductory Statistics
  • Decision Analysis Honours
  • Prescriptive Analytics Masters

Biographical Information

Leanne Scott was appointed lecturer in 1995. Prior to this she worked as a full-time Research Officer in a post funded by the Water Research Commission (1992-1994). She did free-lance consulting during 1990-1992 whilst caring for her young children. She worked for the Institute for Maritime Technology as an operational researcher from 1988 to 1990. During the period 1984 to 1987 she was employed as a Research Fellow at the Clinical Operational Research Unit which is based at University College London, exploring ways of furthering our understanding of intractable diseases through analysis and modelling.

She obtained a B.Sc. in Zoology and Statistics from UCT in 1979, B.Sc. Hons in Operational Research in 1980, M.Sc. in Operational Research in 1983. Her PhD (awarded 2004) thesis was entitled “Legitimacy and Decision Making in Developmental Local Government: Participative MCDA in Stellenbosch”.

Research Interests

Key areas:

  • The use of Multi Criteria Decision Making methods in conjunction with Problem Structuring method applied to in a variety of contexts, including: (i) Natural resource evaluation and (ii) The identification and management of problem gamblers in South Africa (iii) Integrated Development Planning in municipalities.
  • Systemic approaches to One Welfare/ One Health problems.
  • Impact evaluation of non-profit organisations.
  • Development, in collaboration with Prof GDI Barr, a new teaching approach, with associated tools andmaterials, that is embedded in a spread sheet environment which encourages hands on experimentation with manipulating numerical information.

Selected Publications

  • Birkhead, B.G., Rankin, E.M., Gallivan, S., Dones*, L. and Rubens, R.D. A mathematical model of the development of drug resistance to cancer chemotherapy. European Journal of Cancer and Clinical Oncology, Vol. 23, No 9, 1421-1427, 1987.
  • Dones*, L., Wiltshaw, E., Jackson, R.R.P. and Birkhead, B.G. Towards an assessment of toxicity in the treatment of ovarian cancer. Cancer Chemotherapy and Pharmacology, Vol. 20, 213- 218, 1987.
  • Stewart, T.J. and Scott, L. A scenario-based framework for multicriteria decision analysis in water resources planning. Water Resources Research, Vol. 31, No 11, 2835-2843, 1995.
  • Scott, L. A Poverty Indicator System for local government. Development Southern Africa, 19 (4), October 2002.
  • Scott, L. Participative multi-criteria decision analysis: a new tool for integrated development planning, Development Southern Africa, Vol. 22, No 5, pp 695-716, 2005
  • Scott, L. Unpacking developmental local government using Soft Systems Methodology and MCDA, OriON, Vol. 21, No 2, pp 173-195, 2005
  • Barr, G.D.I. and Scott, L. Spreadsheets and Simulation – A new way forward for Teaching Statistics, Electronic Journal of Spreadsheets in Education, Vol 4, Issue3, 2011
  • Scott, L and Joubert, A. Setting goals and growing value trees: aligning monitoring and evaluation across the functions and spheres of government, In: Southall, R. (Ed) Conflict and Governance in Southern Africa: Moving towards a more just and peaceful society (pp55-87). Conflict and Governance Facility, Lyttleton, 2007. ISBN 978-0-620-39562-5

Selected Conference Proceedings

  • Barr, G.D.I. and Scott, L. Embedding the teaching of introductory statistics in a spreadsheet environment. Proceedings of OZCOTS 2010.

Awards

Winner of Tom Rozwadowski medal (annual ORSSA award for best published paper in Operational Research) in 1996, 2006 and 2015.