Interest in big data education programs is ramping up, according to representatives at big data company Teradata, and colleges and universities across the country are trying to figure out how best to meet the workforce needs for big data and analytics experts. However, the company still expects a lag between the workforce demand and the time it will take schools to graduate more students with a big data science background.
Teradata University Network has been in existence for more than 10 years, according to Susan Baxley, its director. Baxley said the resource was initially designed “by faculty, for faculty” as a resource; Teradata works with a board of more than a dozen academics on what resources faculty need to teach about big data and analytics, and work with universities to help develop curricula.
Baxley said that more than 40 universities are working on launching big data programs, and more than 1,700 schools are affiliated with the Teradata University Network. Some universities only offer big data analytics programs at the graduate level, but others are beginning to ramp up their undergraduate offerings. The College of Charleston offers an undergraduate degree in data science and was the first college in the U.S. to do so. Still, Baxley said that despite the increased interest in big data programs in the past few years, it’s going to take some time before those many of those students make it through their programs and into the workforce.
Big data science requires both a strong technical background as well as so-called soft skills around communication and presentation, according to Baxley and Barbara Christjohn, who is Teradata’s director of university new hiring and consulting services.
In some ways, Teradata’s acquisitions have reflected the broader big data ecosystem and its relevance not only for industry, but in education. Although the company has traditionally engaged with business intelligence and management programs, Baxley said that it has extended to computer science and statistics areas. Teradata’s acquisition in 2011 of marketing software company Aprimo has also opened up opportunities for the university network to engage with faculty who specialize in teaching marketing and the applications of big data in that field, she added. Christjohn noted that Teradata is also seeking new hires, and that its desire for employees with familiarity in Hadoop is only likely to increase after its acquisition of Hadoop specialist Think Big Analytics earlier this year.
Along with the hard data skills, both Christjohn and Baxley said, the “soft” skills of good communication are crucial for data scientists, who often are called upon not just to crunch numbers, but to communicate effectively to business professionals about the value of the data being presented and the business challenges it addresses.
“The presentation and the communication of the data is becoming more important than ever — being able to explain the ins and outs of what you found and didn’t find,” Christjohn said.
Baxley said that those are the hardest types of skills for universities to figure out how to integrate with their technical offerings, and that the desire for that skill set opens up big data education for schools to encourage students of multidisciplinary backgrounds to participate in their programs. Technical strength is an essential foundation for success, Baxley noted, but communication skills are crucial as well.
Another important point for the big data workforce, both women agreed, is that the skills sets needed for the big data and analytics market today aren’t likely to the same ones needed in even two to three years as the market evolves.
“You can come to the table with a certain skill set, and be certain now more than ever that that skill set is going to be changing on a two-to-three-year-max basis,” said Baxley. “It’s not like back when you could learn something and go to work for a job for a long time — because it’s just so fluid.”
