The Governor and Mr. Woodliff will be among the speakers at the ceremony.
issued
April 26, 2024
by
kate andrews
Billed as a “school without walls,” the University of Virginia's School of Data Science officially broke ground on its first purpose-built building on Friday, five years after it opened.
“When I came here yesterday on tour, I was a little surprised and a little disappointed, to be honest, and then I realized.” [school without walls] It was just a metaphor, even though the wall was actually needed. ” President Jim Ryan told an audience that included prominent academics and businessmen such as Governor Glenn Youngkin, as well as current and former data science students. “My hope is that the theory of 'schools without walls' will continue to animate this place.”
Ryan, a former law school dean and attorney, is taking an accelerated course to learn more about data science, including artificial intelligence, machine learning, and other data collection methods, as well as the use of data in other fields such as healthcare. He said he was there. And he is in finance. Ryan said the new four-story, 61,000-square-foot facility on Ivy Road in Charlottesville will be the latest in data science because advances in the field are so fast that it's becoming “essential to almost every field.” He said he hopes it will become a center of research. .
Jaffrey Woodliffe, 1991 U.Va. alumnus who co-founded Quantitative Investment Management and donated $120 million with his wife U.Va. in 2019. Alumnus Meryl Woodliffe, who will establish the School of Data Science, also attended Friday's ceremony. He said he became interested in baseball statistics in 1980 when he was an 11-year-old boy.
“At the age of 18, after studying baseball for seven years, I switched my focus to financial markets and applied statistical forecasting to the markets,” Woodriffe said. “It was a chance to solve the challenges we faced as U.Va. Year 1 [student], find out what career you really enjoy and solve your money problems. We believed that if we could gamify investment management, we could overcome both challenges. ”
At the urging of his father, Woodliffe decided to become an entrepreneur. In 2003, he and his two co-founders founded QIM, a Charlottesville-based hedge fund. He and his wife, another of his U.Va. alumni, established the Quantitative Foundation as a philanthropic vehicle, through which he gave the university his $120 million, the university's largest private gift. . The Department of Data Science builds on early academic offerings at the University of Virginia's Data Science Institute, founded in 2013.
The new building will replace three sections of the existing building in Virginia. The location, where data science students and faculty have been working since his 2019, includes a large two-story hub and event area named Capital One, which has invested $2 million. Although much more modern than what many would think of as a Jeffersonian school, the school is designed for meetings and collaboration, with variable seating arrangements and a large atrium. He also has four adaptable classrooms.
Prem Natarajan, chief scientist and head of enterprise AI at Capital One, said the bank made the gift because academic institutions such as UV invest in “invention and discovery.” He also recognizes that a focus on STEM education is critical to building a dynamic technology workforce both in Virginia and indeed across the nation. ”
Youngkin said Virginia's first data science department is “more than just a building. We have some great minds here. We live in a world today that seeks truth and seeks insight.” And with 90% of the world's data being recreated every two years, we have an opportunity to discover that truth, shed light on those insights, and most importantly, lead the way. is born.”
Phil Vaughn, the school's founding dean, said the school works with area K-12 schools to “prepare them for the world of data literacy and what happens when they come to Virginia.” We are prepared,” he said. It's really about lifelong learning…in a field that is changing so rapidly and dramatically. ”
“I plan to work somewhere at the intersection of health care and public policy,” said Sunidhi Goyal, a graduate of the University of Delhi who is pursuing a master's degree at Virginia's School of Data Science. I would like to utilize the skills I gained through this program. A very interdisciplinary approach is taken. Professors come from a variety of backgrounds. ”
And it's just as important for Vaughn and other faculty members. “I think part of the reason we're able to get really good researchers is because they want to work in an interdisciplinary environment. They realize that it creates real value.”