Associate Professor of Computer Science and Statistics Stephan Mandt has been selected as the program chair for the 27th International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Statistics (AISTATS), scheduled to take place from May 2-4, 2024, in Spain. AISTATS stands as a premier conference at the intersection of artificial intelligence and statistics, drawing approximately 800 participants and garnering roughly 2,500 paper submissions. Mandt’s role overseeing the technical program activities underscores his exceptional capabilities and the trust the community places in his expertise. 

Did people enjoy the movie “Spider-Man: No Way Home”? How did fans react to delays in releasing the sequel to “Hollow Knight”? How did red states versus blue states view the 2020 election? Did the release of “Valorant” increase its popularity? And what about the popularity of high school football?

These are the questions 10 high school students, in teams of two, chose to explore during a new Data Science for All summer program held at UC Irvine from July 10–21, 2023. The students analyzed related tweets using Texera, an open source platform for collaborative data analytics. The platform is being developed by Professor Chen Li of the Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences (ICS), who led the summer program in collaboration with Professor Wei Wang of UCLA.

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On July 10, 2023, 17 instructors from all around the country arrived at UC Irvine for a weeklong boot camp aimed at advancing Bayesian Thinking in STEM (BATS). Nancy Elizabeth Wentzel of Tennessee, an assistant math professor at Northeast State Community College, was among the BATS attendees.

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UCI Researchers Receive $600,000 Grant From the Cyrus Tang Foundation

With a grant of nearly $600,000 from the Cyrus Tang Foundation, researchers from UCI and Beijing Normal University have joined forces to study how to improve advanced psychological assessment and modeling, digital mental health and public health services in China. From UCI, the team includes Emily Baum, associate professor of history; Chuansheng Chen, Distinguished Professor of psychological science; Michael Lee, professor of cognitive sciences; Elizabeth A. Martin, associate professor of psychological science; Stephen Schueller, associate professor of psychological science and informatics; Jun Wu, professor of environmental and occupational health; and Zhaoxia Yu, professor of statistics.

Read the full story on UCI News.

Strolling through the Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering Building at UC Irvine on May 25, 2023, local industry leaders saw more than 40 projects on display — including innovative medical solutions, education technology for improved learning outcomes, and projects that could one day spark new startups. These capstone projects, developed over 20 weeks, showcased the knowledge and skills of students in UCI’s Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences (ICS).

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On June 20, 2023, UC Irvine held its final gradution ceremony as students from the Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences (ICS) started their procession into the Bren Events Center for the ICS Commencement Ceremony. “This is the last but certainly not least of the 11 ceremonies,” said Dean Marios C. Papaefthymiou in his welcoming remarks to the crowd of students, families and friends, and esteemed faculty.

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On June 6, 2023, the Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences (ICS) recognized faculty and staff at its annual ICS Awards Celebration. Dean Marios Papaefthymiou welcomed new staff, announced the recipient of the Jim McKenzie Staff Leadership Award, presented the Dean’s Faculty Awards and recognized a variety of faculty members for recent accomplishments.

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As the first UC campus to establish a data science major, UC Irvine has been an educational leader in this growing field for close to a decade. In addition to launching the major in 2015, UCI recently started hosting summer programs for both high school and undergraduate students interested in data analytics and biostatistics, and its SoCal Data Science program helps recruit, train and dispatch a diverse workforce of STEM and data science majors.

Now, the SoCal Data Science program is scaling up, thanks to a $1.3 million Pathways Development grant from the California Education Learning Lab.

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The weather cleared in time to reveal a beautiful blue sky on the evening of May 5, when nearly 200 UC Irvine engineering and information and computer sciences (ICS) alumni, faculty and friends gathered at the Inn at Mission San Juan Capistrano to celebrate six alumni for the 2023 Hall of Fame.

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When the National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded its Graduate Research Fellowships for 2023, only a dozen students across the nation were offered fellowships in the area of statistics. Among the 12 was Christina Magana-Ramirez, a first-year Ph.D. student in UC Irvine’s Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences (ICS).

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