CHARLOTTE AMALIE — The University of the Virgin Islands announced today that the university will offer a Data Science Certificate Program beginning in the Fall 2021 Semester.
The program is designed to help professionals advance their careers by leveraging applied data science.
The 13-credit certificate program comes on the heels of the recently added Data Science Minor, but the requirements for both programs differ slightly. Students pursuing the DS certificate do not have to be enrolled in a degree program at UVI and do not need prior college experience to register.
The program is tailored to benefit participants from varying backgrounds including government employees seeking to support their departments with data analytics, job seekers who want to make themselves more marketable, individuals in the private sector who want to learn how to make data-driven decisions, and students exploring career options.
Registration for the program will open in the fall, but interested students can register now to start taking both core and prerequisite courses during the 2021 Summer Semester. To register, students new to UVI must fill out a registration form and submit to the UVI Office of the Registrar.
“Almost every projection on work forecasts aggressive growth in employment related to data,” said Thomas Lombardi, UVI chair of information systems and technology. “The data science programs at UVI are designed to help professionals adjust to and profit from these trends.”
As they study, students can expect to explore practical ways to use data science to drive better decision making in any industry — agriculture, finance, business, aviation, oceanography and more. They will also explore data governance, data ethics, and ways to impact economic and community development with applied data science.
“It’s important to create a culture of data-driven decision making,” said Dr. Joanne Luciano, distinguished professor of data science at UVI. “How do we use data to become eligible for additional federal funding? Can we detect early signs of new contagious diseases arriving in the territory? What types of industries should the USVI invest in to balance its portfolio? Data science has answers.”
Students pursuing a DS certificate will learn scientific thinking, statistical expertise, business acumen and programming skills. The program prepares students to support an analytics team in identifying, building, and evaluating relevant data models.