March 8, 2023 | Combined Reports - UConn Communications

UConn Students to Showcase Work at NYC Open Data Week

The showcase is likely to be the only presentation in which all presenters are students

Aerial view of lower Manhattan New York City.

UConn students will present their work on using data to solve real-world problems at NYC Open Data Week (Adobe Stock).

UConn data science students have been selected to showcase their work at NYC Open Data Week, an annual festival of community-driven events that promotes the use of open data to improve people’s lives.

The students will present projects featuring data from the New York City 311 requests, which they completed as part of a UConn Introduction to Data Science course (STAT 3255/5255). Presentations will cover data preparation, data visualization, and data analysis works, providing insights into important issues related to civic engagement.

The time in hours taken by NPYD to close the requests made to them during the week of 01/15—01/21, 2023, by borough and day.
The time in hours taken by New York Police Department to close the requests made to them during the week of Jan. 15, 2023, by borough and day (Courtesy of Jun Yan).

“Our students have learned to work with real-world data, thanks to the availability of open data from the New York City government,” says Jun Yan, UConn professor of statistics and the course instructor.

Yan, who is also a co-founder of the Statistical Data Science Lab, emphasized the relevance of open data to students’ learning experiences. “They have developed critical data science skills as well as insights into how data can be used to drive decision-making and social change,” he says.

The course’s class-notes, co-developed by the professor and the students, are publicly available online. The website offers an open-source learning resource that covers various topics, such as data wrangling, exploratory data analysis, statistical modeling, and machine learning.

The virtual workshop, hosted by BetaNYC and Data by Design, will be held on Monday, March 13, 2023, from 2-3 p.m. EST. The event is part of the New York City’s open data initiative, which promotes data transparency and civic engagement. The city’s open data law requires all city agencies to make their non-confidential data public and accessible to everyone. This has led to the creation of a wealth of public data, which can be used for a variety of purposes, including research and analysis.

This is the second time UConn STAT3255/5255 class presents at NYC Open Data Week. The showcase is likely to the only presentation in which all presenters are students.

 

The event is free, but RSVP is required. Attendees can register online at the NYC Open Data Week website. The event is open to everyone with an interest in statistics, data science, or education. Friends and families are all welcome. For more information, please contact Professor Jun Yan at jun.yan@uconn.edu.