Event Date: March 7, 2017
Link: Ninth Data Science Showcase

This showcase addresses the current and future roles of data science in the education sector. The showcase will consist of short presentations by a panel of four leaders from industry and academia, who will provide an overview of current initiatives in their research domains and identify core opportunities for data science to move the field forward. The panel presentations will be followed by a moderated discussion with the Moore-Sloan community.

Speakers:

Ryan Baker is an Associate Professor at the Graduate School of Education at the University of Pennsylvania. He was the founding president of the International Educational Data Mining Society, and currently serves as co-lead of the Big Data in Education spoke of the National Science Foundation's Northeast Big Data Hub. His research draws on data mining, learning analytics, and human–computer interaction, to study how students respond to and learn from educational software.

Saad Khan is a Managing Senior Research Scientist at Educational Testing Service, where he leads research focused on creating highly innovative forms of educational assessments and learning systems. Prior to joining ETS he was at SRI where he led design and development of advanced training systems that can adapt to both changing pedagogical objectives and learners’ behavior. His technical background is in computer vision and machine learning, and his research interests include cognitive computing, deep learning, behavioral analytics, affective computing, and multimodal data fusion.

Jeff Olson is Vice President and Chief Data Officer at the College Board. He is responsible for ensuring that data drives the services, outreach, and intervention strategies provided by the College Board. Prior to joining the College Board in 2013, he led data science and market intelligence for Kaplan Test Prep, informing the development of products and services and helping shape organizational strategy. His surveys and commentary have appeared in many national publications, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, and Newsweek.

Jan L. Plass is the Paulette Goddard chair in Digital Media and Learning Sciences at NYU Steinhardt, where he co-directs the Games for Learning Institute and is the founding director of the CREATE Consortium for Research and Evaluation of Advanced Technology in Education. His research is at the intersection of learning science, cognitive sciences, and design, and seeks to enhance the design and effectiveness of visual environments. His current focus is on cognitive and emotional aspects of information design and interaction design of simulations and educational games for science education and second language acquisition.