Spears School students win national awards
Friday, December 12, 2008
OSU student data mining teams placed second and third at M2008, the annual SAS Data
Mining Conference. Teams were given a problem to solve, and the top three teams won
a cash prize for their university. Second place team members Fengchun Tang (third
from left), Leila Zelnick (fourth from left), Samyog Bhattarai (fifth from left) and
Amjad Elsamen (sixth from left) are pictured with Dow Chemical representatives and
faculty advisor Goutam Chakraborty (second from left). Team members not pictured are
Xing Wan and Xuequn Wang.
OSU student data mining teams placed second and third at M2008, the annual SAS Data
Mining Conference. Teams were given a problem to solve, and the top three teams won
a cash prize for their university. Third place team members Jason White (third from
left) and Miriam McGaugh (fourth from left) are pictured with Dow Chemical representatives
and faculty advisor Goutam Chakraborty (second from left). Team member Gary Hatfield
is not pictured.
Members of the second place team are Samyog Bhattarai, Amjad Elsamen, Fengchun Tang, Xing Wan, Xuequn Wang, and Leila Zelnick from OSU’s management information systems, marketing and statistics programs. Members of the third place team are Gary Hatfield, Miriam McGaugh, and Jason White from OSU’s educational psychology, management information systems, and statistics programs. These students competed against 35 other teams from across the nation.
“I am extremely proud of the OSU teams who took second and third place in the M2008 data mining shootout,” said Goutam Chakraborty, professor of marketing for the Spears School and founder of the SAS/OSU data mining certificate program. “It is a very prestigious honor to do so well in this national shootout.”
The top three teams gave a 15-minute presentation about their modeling method and results at the conference, which was attended by more than 800 professionals and academics.
The data mining problem given to teams included more than 730,000 records from an anonymous airline that operates out of three hub cities. The airline wanted to find which flights are likely to be canceled due to weather and other issues so they could take appropriate managerial actions to minimize the effects of cancellations to its customers.
This is the second time in two years OSU students won the majority of the awards in the data mining shootout competition held annually by SAS. Universities from across the nation participate in this prestigious tournament, and no other university has received more awards than OSU in the history of this tournament.
The OSU students participating in the competition are enrolled in the SAS/OSU data mining certificate program, which began in 2004 when OSU partnered with SAS, a leading provider of data analysis and data mining software. The SAS/OSU data mining certificate requires students to complete 12 credit hours of courses, including two core courses and two elective courses. The certificate program is a core component of the master of science in management information systems degree.
“It is a great honor for OSU students to receive these awards in front of so many data mining professionals,” Chakraborty said. “It is also a testament of the quality of OSU’s data mining program.”
The top three teams' universities received cash prizes from Dow Chemical. OSU teams won a total of $5,000, which will be used to help promote data mining teaching and to support graduate students in data mining. SAS, the Central Michigan University Research Corporation and Dow Chemical teamed up to sponsor the contest for students in data mining.