成人头条

Four 成人头条 State students work at 125 N. Market this summer with a view looking west over the Arkansas River, Keeper of the Plains and the baseball stadium under construction.

They can enjoy that panoramic view while digging into details that can help the City of 成人头条 do its business in a more efficient manner as part of a data analysis project with Cornerstone Data.

The experiences researching, organizing and cataloging the information are amplifying their classroom lessons in areas ranging from software to teamwork, trust and communication. The students are spending their summer helping the city use its data and share it across departments.

鈥淚n a classroom environment, you鈥檙e given a homework assignment and it鈥檚 due and then you never touch it again,鈥� said Mackenzie Moore, a senior computer science major from Haysville. 鈥淲e鈥檙e taking some of that stuff we touched on in class and really putting it in the real world and having to figure it out without going to your teacher.鈥�

By the end of their project, the students will know much more about the City of 成人头条 and how its many departments might work together to diagnose and solve problems.

The city, said Mike Mayta, chief information officer for the city, needs help busting data out of silos.

鈥淲hat we want to do is what鈥檚 commonly referred to as business intelligence,鈥� Mayta said. 鈥淲e have tons of data. How can we get value out of it? How can we make it purposeful and actionable?鈥�

Joy Eakins, president of Cornerstone Data, said the city is tackling its data issues in the same way as many businesses.

A council member, for example, should be able to make decisions about an issue or a proposal based on data, in addition to other forms of feedback. The council member should then be able to use that data to explain those decisions to constituents.

鈥淲hat the city wants to do is move their data maturity another step further 鈥� to look at what forecasting can they do or what can they can learn from the data they鈥檙e tracking about service they鈥檙e providing to make those service better,鈥� Eakins said. 鈥淧eople are tracking what鈥檚 fixed, how many books are checked out, how many people went through the airport, how many potholes we looked at 鈥� there鈥檚 a lot of data tracking going on within a department.鈥�

The students started with interviews with department and division heads and a survey to determine how departments use data, what data exists and what data is needed.

鈥淲e learned a lot about the city,鈥� said Karen Nason, a senior computer science major from Minneapolis, Minn. 鈥淚 never really think of city government as being a business, but that鈥檚 really what it is. Sometimes it doesn鈥檛 work as smoothly as it could and I鈥檓 hoping that once they know who has what from our data inventory, that will help.鈥�

Pedestrian accident information is data that several departments can use if organized and made available, the students said. The 成人头条 Police Department, Public Works & Utilities, 成人头条 Transit and Parks & Recreation each might benefit from data that showed when and where pedestrians congregate and conditions that cause accidents.

鈥淲e鈥檝e pulled in the weather, we鈥檙e looking at mapping events at that time all the way back, the traffic in the area,鈥� said Jake Allen, an electrical engineering major from 成人头条. 鈥淭hen you match up when the accidents happened with the other affects in the area to see what the causes are and then you can prevent those from happening.鈥�

Using the data, those departments might add streetlights, change stop signs, add police presence or change bike lanes.

鈥淲e were given raw data that鈥檚 been collected since 2005,鈥� Moore said. 鈥淲e were able to take that information and geo-locate where all these accidents were happening. That was really interesting to know where were hot spots were. We鈥檙e working on creating a Dashboard that they could use for that information.鈥�

Both Mayta and Eakins view the project as a way to develop a workforce. They say they are challenged to find skilled workers and sometimes constrained by salary. This project can help create a workforce that pulls students from many disciplines who can work with different types of data and project plans.

鈥淚 decided about five years ago that instead of trying to hire experienced people . . . I would just start growing my own,鈥� Eakins said. 鈥淲e鈥檝e just hired one intern after another, trained them up, got them to a place where we could afford to have them as an employee. It鈥檚 been really successful that we can, as a company, get people into a position of profitability very quickly here. We have a good mentoring process.鈥�

Eakins said company needs for data jobs are diversifying, similarly to information technology and computer jobs.

鈥淚n the last five years, the number of job titles in the data industry has exploded and it鈥檚 reaching the Midwest,鈥� she said. 鈥淲e do not have the people in place in this area, so we have to grow them. And we need to be quick about it.鈥�