Florence Hudson
Executive Director of the Northeast Big Data Innovation Hub, Founder of the National Student Data Corps, and Principal Investigator for the COVID Information Commons
Columbia University
Emily Rothenberg
National Student Data Corps Program Coordinator
Columbia University
The Northeast Student Data Corps (NSDC) was launched by the National Science Foundation Northeast Big Data Innovation Hub in 2020 as a community-developed initiative to teach data science fundamentals to students across the Northeastern U.S., with a special focus on underserved institutions and students. The NSDC journey began with the establishment of a founding committee including industry, academia, and nonprofit leaders and students, as was presented at the Fall 2020 CNI Membership Meeting [https://vimeo.com/485317405]. The first NSDC virtual event in February 2021 attracted over 700 registrants. Since then, we have hosted thousands of data science learners and educators in virtual events and programs, fueling the NSDC growth to 4,000 individuals from 28 countries, earning rebranding to the National Student Data Corps with an international reach. Learners and educators have access to 200+ resources in the NSDC Learner Central, Educator Central, Video Library, Career Central, and data ethics comic books. They have learned about data science academic and job opportunities from 50+ data science professionals and students in the data science panel series. Data science and career mentoring is enabled through a Slack channel with over 600 participants. There are 21 student-led NSDC chapters including 14 in the U.S. and 7 in India. Students participate in online data science projects, leverage a Data Science Resource Repository with over 700 resources including 75 in Spanish, write blog posts, co-moderate career panels, and learn individually and in teams to enable their data science journeys. The NSDC has grown into a dynamic, diverse, and inclusive network and community of support for data science learners and educators globally.