Data and Analytics Competition Gives Local High School Students Opportunity to Expand Their Knowledge of Cryptocurrencies

The Haub School of Business and the decision and systems sciences department (DSS) recently launched a six-week analytics and data visualization competition for local area high schools. This first annual competition, sponsored in part by NEST, concluded with a one-day, on-campus event. More than 130 students from high schools across Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware, gathered on Hawk Hill to present their data. 

The competition invited the high school teams to expand their working knowledge and understanding of analytics by exploring a data set, creating visualizations from that data and presenting their findings to judges who work as industry leaders in business intelligence and analytics. The student teams paired up with Saint Joseph’s student and alumni mentors, mainly undergraduate business intelligence and analytics majors/minors, who served as guides as the competitors navigated data visualization software and a curated data set dealing with non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

"One of the most important things we can do as a department and as a University is to enable our students to use the skills that they cultivate in their time with us to provide meaningful service to the community. This competition has provided an opportunity to do just that,” says Janine Guerra, J.D., visiting professor of DSS and competition coordinator.  

Victoria Siano ’22, a double major in business intelligence and analytics and marketing, couldn’t pass up the opportunity to serve as one of the student mentors. “It was really rewarding being able to assist local high school students where I could as they analyzed data and crafted their visualizations,” she says. “I even learned a few skills myself throughout the process.”

In addition to working on their analytic and visualization skills, the high school students partnered with artists across the globe, from Philadelphia to Germany, to further explore the increasingly growing world of NFTs in the art world, the theme of the competition data set. 

Saint Joseph’s partnered with Venture Cafe Philadelphia, an organization that works with artists from the Philadelphia area and beyond who are interested in minting their artwork for sale.This creates a permanent tokenized version of the artwork that is stored on the blockchain and is a way to prove ownership of a digital work. The high school teams gained experience minting an example of these artists' work, which Venture Cafe will later feature in a digital art exhibition, allowing the artists to sell the NFTs. The winning student teams will receive exclusive NFT artwork as well, marking their achievement.

Guerra explains, “Through our partnership with Venture Cafe Philadelphia and others, student participants not only learned about cryptocurrencies and NFTs, but also received hands-on experience by working directly with the artists.” 

A series of webinars for the artists have been hosted by Venture Cafe Philadelphia in collaboration with Ginny Miori Ph.D., professor and department chair of decision and system sciences, focusing on profiting off of NFTS. Beyond hosting these webinars, Miori was an integral part of bringing the competition to fruition.

“In our increasingly divided world, students with analytics skills have a unique opportunity to both work toward the future and to engage in the moment,” says Miori. “Our St. Joe’s students and alumni mentors blend technology with service on a regular basis. Their active participation in this competition is just one example of the ways in which our students show leadership and support for their communities every day.” 

Additionally, the DSS department has partnered with Saint Joseph’s education department to offer optional continuing education credits to eligible secondary educators whose students participated in the competition. 

Out of the 16 participating high schools, The Episcopal Academy took first place in this year’s competition. Guerra and Miori look forward to hosting again next academic year, with hopes of including even more high school students.