The world has been transformed by the increased availability of data, the development of new tools to understand it, and the proliferation of ways to use it in applications and creative endeavors. Data touches every aspect of the university’s mission and potentially every member of the campus and community. We call this phenomenon DataX. DataX acknowledges that data is transforming research, scholarship, artistic creation, education, and the opportunities available to our students in fundamental ways. At DataX, we prioritize social and ethical concerns, and differentiate ourselves from other data science initiatives by foregrounding issues at the intersection of data, justice, and society.
DataX is an initiative with collaboration and connection at the center of its efforts. At DataX, we strive to serve the UCLA community by offering programs and services to students, faculty, researchers and partners across disciplines who engage in activities related to data: collecting, archiving, storing, processing, analyzing, and using data to make predictions, decisions and even critique of such use.
DataX will complement and build on the existing data science and critical data studies ecosystem at UCLA. Our goal is to cohere these activities at UCLA through an umbrella structure where the sum is greater than the parts. We aim to provide clear identification of courses and interdisciplinary research opportunities in three equal and overlapping areas: fundamental data science, innovative applications and creative activity, and data justice and critical data studies.
We invite you to explore DataX.
UCLA is poised to remain a global leader at the intersection of data, knowledge, technology, society and justice as we build academic programs and foster stronger research collaborations in the coming years through DataX.
