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PDFCustomer Success | University of Central Florida Data Mining Program students make something real out of SAS® trainingThe Data Mining Program (DMP) at the University of Central Florida (UCF) partners with SAS to provide students with the necessary data analysis skills to make sound business decisions throughout their careers. Established by Dr. Morgan Wang, UCF Professor and Director of DMP, the program has about 60 graduates. The DMP also attracts students from several disciplines outside of statistics, including engineering, science and technology. Wang explains why the courses appeal to so many fields through colorful data analysis examples:
The DMP boasts a 100 percent summer intern and job placement rate among its students and recent graduates. UCF student Wenbo Wu discusses the DMP’s real-world applications by pointing out that using SAS is the only way to handle large amounts of data, and that he used it every day during his internship at Disney. Before taking the course, Wu only used Excel for data analysis, but he was able to learn how to use SAS quickly through the DMP, giving him an advantage over other students without SAS training. "The Data Mining Program was extremely valuable; I feel that I learned more than what I paid for, and I think my classmates would agree," Wu says. Program embraced by business community Companies – especially those in the surrounding UCF community – see the value of data analysts with SAS skills. Brad Jordan, Head of Marketing Analytics for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida, says that with the help of the program's students and development of predictive models in the marketing department, the company has lowered new member acquisition costs by as much as 70 percent. "We've also increased our ability to target cross-sell prospects and increase sales on non-health insurance products. Other statistical models, developed by graduates of the DMP, identify our member's risk of churn or attrition. This information is essential to retain existing customers. The models have helped increase the profitability of the business, and lowered medical costs for our members," he says. Other companies that benefit from the DMP include local hospitals, food services companies, supermarkets and entertainment companies. These are just a few of the Florida businesses that depend on UCF students and faculty to enhance their capability in making fact-based business decisions.  "When our students get hired by big companies, such as AAA or BCBS, I often receive e-mails from them saying how great the students are and how they want to hire more next year," says Wang. "This is how I ensure that my program is producing students that the industries need. We have students in Travelers, Citigroup, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, in addition to local businesses, showing us that the program is good and in demand."Federal government organizations such as the FBI, the CIA and the Navy have also hired UCF DMP students. "They all do intelligence work for the country," he says. "It's good for society to produce these kinds of students." Practical training for the real world The UCF DMP was the first such program in the United States and inspired subsequent programs at the University of Alabama, Texas A&M University, Oklahoma State University, Central Michigan University and many others. Still, UCF's program prides itself in a couple of unique qualities. "First, everything we work on is based on real data; we don't give any statistical assignments using fake information. The data we use in our classrooms may come from SAS and other public sources such as data mining competitions and government. It's all real data, real problems," explains Wang. Wu agrees: "I realized that this program was more about practical training when we starting working with real statistics; we weren't studying theory out of a textbook all day. We even take projects from other university departments, such as evaluation data like teacher ratings." Second, the program encourages students to take their research and statistical work to the next level: presentations and reports. "Students aren't just solving a problem after they make a discovery. They need to be able to communicate their idea to people without any statistical back-ground," says Wang. "You need to do both – not just please yourself, but make sure that people know your value. Our students aren't just solving a problem; they're making something real." The results illustrated in this article are specific to the particular situations, business models, data input, and computing environments described herein. Each SAS customer’s experience is unique based on business and technical variables and all statements must be considered non-typical. Actual savings, results, and performance characteristics will vary depending on individual customer configurations and conditions. SAS does not guarantee or represent that every customer will achieve similar results. The only warranties for SAS products and services are those that are set forth in the express warranty statements in the written agreement for such products and services. Nothing herein should be construed as constituting an additional warranty. Customers have shared their successes with SAS as part of an agreed-upon contractual exchange or project success summarization following a successful implementation of SAS software. Brand and product names are trademarks of their respective companies. Copyright © SAS Institute Inc. All Rights Reserved. |
Dr. Morgan Wang, UCF Professor and Director of DMP University of Central FloridaChallenge:
Equip UCF students from across disciplines with data mining skills that will help them succeed in their careers. Solution:
The UCF Data Mining Program, in partnership with SAS, provides students with immediately applicable data mining expertise to handle today's ever-growing information needs. Benefits:
The program achieves a 100 percent internship and job placement rate among the students and recent graduates, benefiting the business community and society overall. “The data mining program was extremely valuable; I feel that I learned more than what I paid for and I think my classmates would agree.” Wenbo Wu, UCF DMP student Read more:
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