In an effort to address skills and opportunity gaps within the workforce, technology company Correlation One has established Data Science For All/Empowerment (DS4A)—a program that offers free data analytics training, networking and career coaching to individuals from underrepresented backgrounds.
The first cohort consisting of 500 people was launched last year. Now however, to meet their goal of training at least 10,000 people over the next three years, Correlation One collaborated with SoftBank and Miami-Dade College (MDC).
“Data literacy is a new and emerging literacy that we believe is incredibly important for the jobs of the future…,” said Rasheed Sabar, co-founder and co-CEO of Correlation One. “We basically started [DS4A/Empowerment] to say, ‘look, let’s proactively and surgically remove the barriers that keep underrepresented minorities outside of the jobs of tomorrow.”
As part of the partnership with MDC—a Hispanic-serving institution—current students and Miami residents are able to earn course credit for the program. To improve their own course curriculum, several MDC faculty members also plan to enroll.
“Our goal is to learn how these case studies are implemented to hopefully start bringing more case studies to our program,” said Antonio Delgado, dean of engineering, technology and design at MDC. “It is not just theory and hands-on learning, but also these up-to-date case studies that can be incorporated into our school programs for the students to really get more idea of how data analysis is implemented nowadays.”
The cost of the program is subsidized by industry partners and donors.
