The Department of Mathematics at Illinois State University will welcome students to the new interdisciplinary data science program in this fall semester.
The program has been supported by State Farm with a $3 million gift.
State Farm committed this gift in December. The company provided $1 million for faculty recruitment and research. In addition, $2 million will go to scholarships for students in the program.
The data science program will include coursework from multiple disciplines. Students in this program will take math and information technology classes before coursework focused on data science.
“We believe that this interdisciplinary approach will be attractive to students, employers and also help us build more relationships between different groups across campus,” Chair of the Mathematics Department Benton Duncan said.
There are four sequences offered within this program. They are Big Data and Computational Intelligence, Business Analytics and Population Health and Social Demographic and Public Policy. Students can customize their major by taking courses from the different sequences.
Professor Vishal Midha will be an instructor for this program. He will teach forensic analysis courses where students will learn to detect fraud through financial data analysis.
“What excites me most about this program is the opportunity to prepare students for real-world impact,” Midha said. “Through our coursework, they will develop the technical skills to analyze financial data and identify fraudulent activities—increasingly crucial capabilities in today’s digital economy.”
The board of trustees at ISU approved this program in May 2023. This program addresses the growing demandfor data scientists. It will also prepare students to analyze and interpret big data using data visualization and statistical models.
Leah Gutierrez is a news and features reporter for The Vidette. Gutierrez can be contacted at lgutie8@ilstu.edu.
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