Service Learning in Analytics Courses: a Case Study of the Benefits of Teaching Through Helping Others

• Activity Number: 195 - SPEED: Modernization of What, How, and Where We Teach Statistics Part 2
• Type: Contributed
• Date/Time: Monday, July 29, 2019 : 11:35 AM to 12:20 PM
• Sponsor: Section on Statistics and Data Science Education
• Author(s): Kathleen Garwood* and Vipul Gupta
• Companies: Saint Joseph's University and Saint Joseph's University
• Keywords: analytics; service learning; pairwise design; real world data

Abstract

Teaching analytics requires an openness to understand the students’ base knowledge and an ability to motivate each student to see the reason behind learning, applying and articulating the analysis at hand. A method which truly stimulates student’s drive to do more and be more is the use of real data to provide a classroom experience that challenges the students to use analysis to help others. Applying service learning in an analytics class is both invigorating and overwhelming, yet provides a backdrop for creating future analysts who recognize both how to properly analyze data and that they are not limited to analyzing only for those who can pay for their skills. An overarching question remains: what effect does the service learning component truly have on the students? This paper assesses the effect of an analytics service learning course comparing two parallel classes (day, time, material, instructor). The evaluation of this pairwise analysis where both classes spend 7 weeks working on one “real” data set (one for a third world schools system to address needs based on poverty, the other for a for-profit organization to address needs as outlined by the CEO) will be shared.