Policy Datafest: second annual multidisciplinary data mining challenge

The Master of Public Service (MPS) program is proud to present Policy Datafest 2020, the second annual two-day challenge in which graduate students will analyze data sets provided by government departments and agencies. Each student team is given a pressing question about Canadian social, economic, and environmental conditions - it's then up to them to analyze the data and develop insights and actions relevant to policymakers.

Along with students in the Master of Public Service program, graduate student teams from a wide range of Waterloo graduate programs will compete. In the 2019 inaugual Datafest, students used open data sets from government agencies such as Environment and Climate Change Canada, Ontario Ministry of Transportation, and the Region of Waterloo. Analyzing these data, the 15 teams presented their insights, addressing questions such as:

• How successful are Canadians in collaborating with foreign inventors to develop new inventions? 
• How have commuting patterns from and to the GTA changed over the past two decades?
• Are children in low income areas more likely to have lower language, cognitive development and communication skills?

• What is the relationship between unemployment and wages?

Sponsored by the Royal Bank of Canada (RBC), Policy Datafest is the first of its kind to be hosted by a Canadian university. Organized by the MPS program, the objective is to bring contemporary policy questions faced by different levels of government to the attention of graduate students skilled in data analytics and the ability to extract meaningful policy narratives from datasets.

Faculty, staff, and numerous participating government and business representatives will hear the students' final presentations. Read the story about Datafest 2019.