John Deere Foundation awards grant for endowed chair in data analytics

Sept. 26, 2016

Augustana has received a $1.5 million grant from the John Deere Foundation to establish the Robert A. Hanson Endowed Chair in Data Analytics.

This endowed chair is a critical step in the creation of a data analytics academic program at Augustana. Hiring an established professor in this field will help the college engineer a program that builds on its strengths, remains true to its liberal arts and sciences tradition and mission, capitalizes on its location and existing partnerships, and prepares Augustana students to solve the complex challenges faced by 21st-century employers.

“The growing importance of data analytics in making business decisions is becoming more widely recognized, and the John Deere Foundation is delighted to partner with Augustana on this exciting initiative,” said Mara Sovey Downing, president of the John Deere Foundation. “We believe this could be a game changer for the Quad-Cities community in providing skilled talent to fill this growing STEM-related need.”

The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts employment in data analytics will grow by 30 percent by 2024. The demand for managers and analysts who can understand and make decisions using “big data” is estimated to reach 1.5 million by 2018.

Augustana will be part of a small group of liberal arts colleges offering an undergraduate degree in data analytics.

“We looked at the program at Denison University before generating our proposal,” said Dr. John Delaney, professor and chair of the accounting department. “One of the advantages we see for Augustana students is that we’ll draw from many disciplines on campus for students and introduce topics that may or may not be included at other institutions, such as the ethical uses of data analysis, critical analysis of data for decision-making purposes, and effective communication of the analysis.”

Dr. Delaney and Dr. Jon Clauss have been and will continue to be instrumental in building the college’s data analytics program, with plans to introduce a minor and major in 2018 and 2020, respectively. The minor will be a natural supplemental course of study for business and all its concentrations (management, marketing, finance, international business and management information systems), as well as economics, biology and public health.

The preliminary design of Augustana’s proposed program will have five components: prerequisite courses in statistics, spreadsheets and databases; courses in computer science; three specific data analytics courses; electives in the student’s chosen field; and an internship or major project within a student’s field that incorporates data analytics.

This will be the first program at Augustana to invite industry participation from development to implementation, including welcoming data analytics experts from area businesses to share their expertise in the classroom. In addition, Augustana’s location in the Quad Cities provides many opportunities for internships and community outreach.

The data analytics major and minor will be open to any student on campus, regardless of major area of interest. Any department whose majors need to analyze large volumes of data will be good candidates to participate in the program. This would include accounting, business administration, biology, computer science, geography, mathematics and psychology, among others.