{"id":188865,"date":"2022-08-11T07:30:06","date_gmt":"2022-08-11T11:30:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=188865"},"modified":"2022-08-15T09:05:12","modified_gmt":"2022-08-15T13:05:12","slug":"uconns-new-multidisciplinary-data-science-masters-starts-this-fall-with-focus-on-ethics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2022\/08\/uconns-new-multidisciplinary-data-science-masters-starts-this-fall-with-focus-on-ethics\/","title":{"rendered":"New Multidisciplinary Data Science Master\u2019s Starts this Fall"},"content":{"rendered":"

From online streaming to health care systems, from retailers to researchers, the demand for knowledgeable and skilled data scientists has never been greater.<\/p>\n

UConn has stepped up to meet the need with the launch of a new multidisciplinary Master\u2019s in Data Science<\/a> program and an inaugural full-time cohort of 20 students starting in the upcoming Fall 2022 semester.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe demand has been nothing short of extraordinary,\u201d says Peter Diplock, UConn\u2019s associate vice-provost for the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning and co-director of the master\u2019s program.<\/p>\n

Based on the Storrs campus, the 11-month and 30-credit program draws from faculty expertise in five of UConn\u2019s schools and colleges: the College of Agriculture, Health and Natural Resources; the School of Business; the School of Engineering; the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences; and the Neag School of Education.<\/p>\n

Beyond the 18 credit multidisciplinary core curriculum \u2013 which includes a strong focus on ethics as well as design, programming, machine learning, and data analysis \u2013 students can choose from 12 different areas of concentration within the program that range from bioinformatics to cybersecurity to social and behavioral analytics.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough the core set of knowledge for students who are interested in applying data science to something like marketing are the same as someone who would apply it to health informatics, the way in which it’s applied, the way you get the data, the way you deal with the data, the way you interpret the data once it’s collected, is going to be different for somebody who’s doing marketing than somebody who’s doing health informatics,\u201d explains Kent Holsinger, UConn\u2019s vice provost for graduate education, dean of The Graduate School, and co-director of the master\u2019s program.<\/p>\n

\n

The interest has been extraordinary, and the diversity of students interested has been affirming. — Peter Diplock, Associate Vice Provost<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\u201cWe wanted to make sure that students had a good, solid foundation in the fundamentals of data science,\u201d Holsinger says, \u201cwith the opportunity to specialize in areas that were of particular interest to them and for pursuing careers.\u201d<\/p>\n

All students in the new master\u2019s program will complete a team-based capstone project, where they\u2019ll work to solve a real-world problem and develop practical skills through an experiential learning opportunity.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe’re cultivating opportunities to work with employers in the state of Connecticut, and in the region and beyond, on projects \u2013 messy, sticky problems that are characteristic of the kind of projects employers face daily,\u201d Diplock says. \u201cThese projects are critically important for students to be able to develop key competencies of practice related to data integrity and quality, surfacing assumptions, iterative model building, and communicating insights and impacts.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the initial cohort will partake in an in-person program, the University plans to launch a parallel and fully online program in Fall 2023, designed for people who are working but interesting in enhancing their skills or pivoting in their career.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe interest has been extraordinary, and the diversity of students interested has also been affirming,\u201d says Diplock. \u201cWhen we envisioned this program, we thought about a student who has an undergraduate degree in economics, or in education, or in business, or in fine arts, or in history, or physics or computer science. When I say it’s been affirming, it\u2019s because we\u2019re seen exactly that, where the students who are attracted this program come from diverse prior academic backgrounds.\u201d<\/p>\n

Planning for the new program began four years ago, when Diplock \u2013 who, in his role with the University, works to take program ideas, research them, shape them, and bring them to life \u2013 received two proposals from two different department heads about launching new programs in data science. He engaged a diverse faculty team to explore the concept, to connect with industry, and to really learn what knowledge skills and abilities employers needed from data science graduates.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was at a time when there was a lot around data analytics, but data science was really just emerging as a sort of distinct field,\u201d he explains, \u201cand as I came to understand the space better, I became more convinced that it was truly a multidisciplinary space. In our program, the extent to which we have embraced and intentionally sought out a multidisciplinary approach is unique.\u201d<\/p>\n

As is the program\u2019s focus on ethics \u2013 while all students in the program must complete a dedicated two-credit course in data ethics, ethical concepts have been intentionally woven throughout all elements of the curriculum.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s really vital when people are dealing with data, especially these enormous datasets that are now available and widely used, that they be very careful in thinking about how the data were collected, what biases may have been incorporated into collecting the data itself, and then what biases could arise from employing different algorithms,\u201d says Holsinger.<\/p>\n

\u201cModels will by their nature be imprecise,\u201d Diplock says, \u201cand we owe it to people to make sure that our students have a deep understanding of what the ethical implications are of the models that they’re building and to be able to take those conversations head-on, as opposed to sidestepping.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

For more information about UConn\u2019s new Master\u2019s (MS) in Data Science program, visit <\/em>masters.datascience.uconn.edu<\/em><\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Meeting the growing demand for data scientists to tackle the most complex problems in society<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":134,"featured_media":176532,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2275,2224,1866,2226,2404,1855,1862,1875,2235,2227,2233],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2168],"class_list":["post-188865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academic-affairs","category-cahnr","category-engr","category-clas","category-data-science","category-neag","category-busn","category-grad-school","category-today-homepage","category-uconn-edu-homepage","category-university-news"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-12 18:20:00","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/134"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=188865"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188865\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":189047,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/188865\/revisions\/189047"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/176532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=188865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=188865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=188865"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=188865"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=188865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}