What is the ASA Datafest™?
The American Statistical Association (ASA) DataFest™ is a celebration of data in which student teams work around the clock to find and share meaning in a large, rich, and complex dataset.
DataFest was founded at UCLA in 2011 when 30 students gathered for 48 intense hours to help fight crime through an analysis of every arrest record of the last 5 years as provided by Lt. Thomas Zak of the Los Angeles Police Department. ASA DataFest is now sponsored by the American Statistical Association and is hosted by several of the most prestigious colleges and universities around the country and involves over 500 students. In 2014, teams came from UCLA, Pomona College, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, UC Riverside, University of Southern California, Duke, the University of North Carolina, North Carolina State, Emory, Princeton, Dartmouth, Smith, Hampshire, Amherst, Mt. Holyoke and the University of Massachusetts.
Penn State University is joining this event for the first time this year!
For more information, see the following articles about ASA DataFest:
- CHANCE Magazine’s A Celebration of Data
- Amstat News’ A Festival of Data: Student Perspectives and Big Data Goes to College
- The 538 blog’s The Students Most Likely to Take our Jobs
Who may participate?
ASA Datafest™ at Penn State University is open to all undergraduate students and Master’s students at Penn State University, main campus or branch campuses.
There is no fee to participate.
Students compete in teams of 2 to 5. You may form your own team prior to the event, or you may ask to be placed on a team. We encourage you to form teams of individuals from different disciplines, because you will benefit from having team members of diverse backgrounds and skills.
Registration
Each individual participating in Datafest must submit a registration. If you form your own team, each member of your team must register separately and include the team name on the form. If you have not formed a team, you will have the chance on the registration form to request placement onto a team.
Registration has ended. If you are still interested in participating, we may be able to accommodate you: please contact us (information at the bottom of this page).
Judging and Prizes
Each team must present a short 4-minute presentation summarizing their findings to a panel of judges comprised of faculty and professionals from a variety of fields. Prizes include gift cards to Amazon!Presentations are judged based on creativity, insight, visualization, and communication.
First Place
Spark
Nicholas Hilman
Dominic Mirabile
William Powell
Hao Xu
Christopher Sharkey
Sponsors and Contributors
Thank you to our sponsors and contributors! We could not have done this without you.