1. Cross Disciplinary Science Leanna House, Statistics
Educating for
Cross Disciplinary Science
Leanna House, Statistics

2. A Minor Cog in the CMDA Wheel
Who am I?
A Minor Cog in the CMDA Wheel
Dr. Eric Smith, Statistics:
Wrote the CMDA proposal to SHEV
Dr. Mark Embree, Mathematics:
Division Lead of CMDA
Dr. Michel Pleiming, Physics:
Director Academy of Integrated Science
Many faculty on the development team
Many faculty teaching, developing, participating

3. Today with CMDA What is it? Milestones and administration Curriculum
CMDA moving forward
Summary

4. Virginia Tech’s CMDA Degree COMPUTATIONAL MODELING AND DATA ANALYTICS
Disease spread model from Dr Matthias Chung
HOW DO YOU MODEL THE WORLD ?
HOW DO YOU LEARN FROM VOLUMINOUS DATA ?
HOW DO YOU COMPUTE FAST ENOUGH TO MATTER ?

5. Fundamental Philosophy
CMDA = data science + modeling + computing + applications.
“BIG DATA” IS DRIVEN BY ALGORITHMIC ADVANCES IN: – linear algebra / matrix theory
– optimization
– high performance computing
MODERN MATHEMATICAL MODELING DEMANDS STATISTICS:
– uncertainty quantification
– stochastic differential equations
STUDENTS SHOULD IMPLEMENT THESE IDEAS IN CODE
– More than users of packages: implementation inspires algorithms.
STUDENTS BENEFIT FROM A ROBUST FOUNDATION IN:
– mathematics
– statistics
– computer science (including Java, Python, R, MATLAB, and beyond)

6. “110 majors by the target year of the program (2018–2019)”
CMDA Milestones
2011 – 2013 CMDA major designed by VT faculty
CMDA major approved by VT, State of Virginia
Spring CMDA major opens to current VT undergraduates
Fall First CMDA freshman class arrives (45 students)
May First CMDA majors graduate (20 students)
Fall Fourth CMDA freshman class arrives (97 students)
“Benchmark of success” in the SCHEV proposal:
“110 majors by the target year of the program (2018–2019)”

7. Growth of CMDA since 2015

8. Administrative Structure SCHOLARSHIPS SCHEDULING
COLLEGE OF
ENGINEERING
COLLEGE OF SCIENCE
COMPUTER
SCIENCE
DEPARTMENT
CMDA FACULTY
MATH
DEPARTMENT
CMDA FACULTY
STATISTICS
DEPARTMENT
CMDA FACULTY
ACADEMY OF
INTEGRATED
SCIENCE (AIS)
ADVISING
ASSESSMENT
BUDGET
SCHOLARSHIPS SCHEDULING
LOGISTICS

9. Ingredients of CMDA Curriculum
STATISTICS FOR BIG DATA
Data mining, machine learning, probability, visualization
APPLIED MATHEMATICS FOR MODELING
Linear algebra, differential equations, numerical analysis
HIGH-PERFORMANCE COMPUTING
Parallel/GPU programming for data/science/engineering apps
ACCESS TO RELEVANT APPLICATIONS: CMDA TRACKS Three special CMDA options: Physics, Economics, Biological Sciences
PRACTICAL SKILLS FOR PROBLEM SOLVING
Ethics, collaboration, leadership, presentation skills

10. HIGH PERFORMANCE COMPUTING
CMDA
Curriculum
CALCULUS
LINEAR ALGEBRA
SOFTWARE
DESIGN &
PROGRAMMING
INTEGRATED
QUANTITATIVE
SCIENCE
HIGH PERFORMANCE COMPUTING
MATHEMATICAL
MODELING
DATA ANALTYICS
&
VISUALIZATION
CAPSTONE
PROJECT
Four electives drawn primarily from
CMDA
COMPUTER SCIENCE
MATHEMATICS
STATISTICS

11. Capstone Project Course
Teams of 3–4 students work on one project for the entire semester.
Projects come from external clients (companies or within VT).
Teams are guided through a methodical problem-solving process.
Focus on teamwork, leadership, collaboration skills, ethics, project management, and communications (written, visual, oral).

13. Where Do They Go From Here?
DESTINATIONS OF SOME 2017 CMDA GRADUATES
GENERAL DYNAMICS (3)
OPTUM (2)
AMAZON
LOS ALAMOS
NATIONAL LAB
MITRE CORPORATION
FIDELITY (2)
CAPITAL ONE
ACCENTURE
Serkan, I moved these slides here!
COLLEGE BASKETBALL GRAD ASST
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT
GRADUATE SCHOOL
HIGH SCHOOL
TEACHING

14. Where Do They Go From Here?
DESTINATIONS OF SOME 2017/18 CMDA GRADUATES
ACCENTURE
DELOITTE
CAPITAL ONE (2)
ERNST & YOUNG (2)
GENERAL DYNAMICS
BOOZ ALLEN HAMILTON
LOCKHEED MARTIN
OCTO CONSULTING (3)
NIELSEN (2)
MITRE (2)
MICROSOFT (2)
TIVE
US AIR FORCE
ONE WEB (2)
HOWARD HUGHES MEDICAL INSTITUTE
ONEWEB

15. Alum Profile: Data Analytics for Physics
2017 CMDA alum Alex Gagliano conducted astronomy research in
Africa, South America.
Presently employed at Los Alamos National Laboratory, he is applying to graduate programs in Physics to pursue his interest in using data analytics to identify gravitational waves.
CMDA major Alex Gagliano’s TEDx talk “Looking Out to Look In”

16. CMDA Moving Forward
CONTINUE TO DIVERSIFY CAPSTONE EXPERIENCES
As CMDA continues to grow, the welcomed challenge is to continue to partnering with industry and academia on diversify projects on which students work.
DEGREE OPTION IN CYBERSECURITY
We are exploring the possibility of developing a CMDA degree option in Cybersecurity, consonant with the Commonwealth Cyber Initiative.
GRADUATE PROGRAM POSSIBILITIES
Graduate certificate for all VT grad students NSF Training Grant application to be submitted in Spring.
Professional master’s degree in NCR Can potentially develop in partnership with Statistics Department’s M.A. in Data Analytics and Applied Science (DAAS)
Research masters and PhD programs in Blacksburg Faculty aim to recruit excellent graduate students to work in CMDA

17. Thank you