News
DataFest an Amazing Success Once Again
April 2017
Elizabeth Jenike
The idea for DataFest began many years ago in a faraway land - 2011 at the University of California, Los Angeles. The original DataFest saw 30 students gather for 48 hours to analyze arrest records provided by the LA police department. Now there are 33 university hosts of the competition across the U.S., Canada and Germany.
At Miami University’s event alone, 89 students participated from Miami, Bowling Green State University and the University of Cincinnati, comprising 22 teams that all focused on analyzing and exploring specific data problems. This number is especially important because it’s twice as many participants as 2016 - our first DataFest.
The event is a true “celebration of data” that brings together students from around the region to draw meaningful insights from a pool of information - with the added benefit of bringing the analytics community under one roof.
This year, judges from Purdue University, IBM, EY, Cardinal Health, Cleveland Clinic, AllState and Procter & Gamble traveled to Oxford and presented the students with cash prizes for the winning projects - $1000 for first place, $750 for second and $500 for third.
The team that snagged first place - and the $1,000 prize check - was called “We R 100% Confident.”
A group of Miami students also came away with the third-place spot.
“It was an intense competition, but working with amazing teammates to solve a real-world problem made the entire experience worthwhile,” said senior accountancy major Seth Levitt. “I appreciated the support of faculty and other volunteers who dedicated their time to make DataFest a great experience. Exploring a large data set, identifying a business problem, and drawing insights in less than two days was challenging, but I learned a lot and am extremely grateful for the experience.”
DataFest an Amazing Success Once Again
April 2017
Elizabeth Jenike
The idea for DataFest began many years ago in a faraway land - 2011 at the University of California, Los Angeles. The original DataFest saw 30 students gather for 48 hours to analyze arrest records provided by the LA police department. Now there are 33 university hosts of the competition across the U.S., Canada and Germany.
At Miami University’s event alone, 89 students participated from Miami, Bowling Green State University and the University of Cincinnati, comprising 22 teams that all focused on analyzing and exploring specific data problems. This number is especially important because it’s twice as many participants as 2016 - our first DataFest.
The event is a true “celebration of data” that brings together students from around the region to draw meaningful insights from a pool of information - with the added benefit of bringing the analytics community under one roof.
This year, judges from Purdue University, IBM, EY, Cardinal Health, Cleveland Clinic, AllState and Procter & Gamble traveled to Oxford and presented the students with cash prizes for the winning projects - $1000 for first place, $750 for second and $500 for third.
The team that snagged first place - and the $1,000 prize check - was called “We R 100% Confident.”
A group of Miami students also came away with the third-place spot.
“It was an intense competition, but working with amazing teammates to solve a real-world problem made the entire experience worthwhile,” said senior accountancy major Seth Levitt. “I appreciated the support of faculty and other volunteers who dedicated their time to make DataFest a great experience. Exploring a large data set, identifying a business problem, and drawing insights in less than two days was challenging, but I learned a lot and am extremely grateful for the experience.”