Carolina MPA Calendar

• March 13-17: Spring Break for on-campus courses
• March 23: Registration opens for May term courses
• March 24: Fall registration begins for on-campus courses
• April 6-7: Wellbeing Day & Spring Holiday for on-campus courses
• April 9: End of January online courses
• May 1: beginning of May online courses
• May 9: End of Spring on-campus courses
• May 12-14: Spring Graduation Weekend
• July 30: end of May online classes

Congratulations to MPA student Sherese Bonner, who has been named a 2023 Presidential Management Fellow Finalist! Of the more than 10,000 individuals from around the world who applied for the program, 850 Finalists were chosen. The large number of applications to this competitive program marks a record number of applications over the past ten years.  

“Presidential Management Fellows are the next generation of government leaders," said Kiran Ahuja, Director of OPM. "The PMF Program gives Fellows the leadership skills and exposure they need to make a difference in government and an impact within their community. Congratulations, Sherese!

• UNC Graduate School offers Professional Development courses
• March 7: Navigating the Film Industry with Rayna McClendon
• Due March 7: Join the Data Matters Short Course Series
• Due March 10: Nomination for the 2023 Faculty Award for Excellence in Graduate Education and Academic Program Support are being accepted
• Coming in April: Carolina Celebrates Planet Earth
• April 14:The 25th Annual Graduate Student Recognition Celebration

The Department of Communication is presenting the next installment of the Alumni Spotlight event series, Navigating the Film Industry with Rayna McClendon. This event will take place on March 7th at 5:30pm in Caldwell 105 featuring an in-depth conversation about Rayna's career journey as a TV screenwriter and producer. The conversation will be moderated by faculty member Renee Alexander Craft. The event is free and open to the public. UNC Students may also receive CLE credit for attending. No RSVP necessary. It's greatly appreciated if you can share with your audiences and organizations who may be interested.

Rayna McClendon is a 2009 UNC graduate from the Department of Communication and Writing for Stage and Screen program. She is currently a co-executive producer for Marvel. McClendon served as a supervising producer for the upcoming series Willlow (2022) for Lucasfilm and Disney+ and a consulting producer on the Disney+ Obi-Wan Kenobi series (2022). McClendon has also written for AMC’s The Walking Dead: The World Beyond (2021), USA Network's Briarpatch (2019), Syfy’s Deadly Class (2019), and Netflix’s Damnation (2018).

The National Consortium for Data Science, in partnership with RENCI and the Odum Institute, is hosting its springtime iteration of the Data Matters short-course series, virtually from March 13 - 16, 2023 — during UNC Spring Break. It’s a great way for someone to learn new skills and expand their knowledge on a subject as they apply for internships, jobs and promotions. 

Data Matters: Spring Ahead | Virtual | March 13 - 16, 2023

Data Matters™ is a week-long series of one and two-day courses aimed at students and professionals in business, research, and government. The short course series is sponsored by the Odum Institute for Research in Social Science at UNC-Chapel Hill, the National Consortium for Data Science, and RENCI. Our first-ever springtime series, Data Matters: Spring Ahead, will feature a selection of our most popular two-day courses. Learn more on their website. 

Among the classes available are:

• Introduction to Effective Information Visualization, Eric Monson. Visualization is a powerful way to reveal patterns in data, attract attention, and get your message across to an audience quickly and clearly. However, there are many steps in that journey from information to influence, and many questions – what visualization tools to use, how to get data into the right format, and which choices to make when putting it all together to tell your story? This course will quickly walk participants through a wide variety of data and chart types to help even beginners feel comfortable embarking on a new visualization project.
• Visualization for Data Science in R, Angela Zoss. Data science skills are increasingly important for research and industry projects. With complex data science projects, however, come complex needs for understanding and communicating analysis processes and results. Ultimately, an analyst’s data science toolbox is incomplete without visualization skills. Incorporating effective visualizations directly into the analysis tool you are using can facilitate quick data exploration, streamline your research process, and improve the reproducibility of your research. This course is designed for two audiences: experienced visualization designers looking to apply open data science techniques to their work, and data science professionals who have limited experience with visualization.

• Basics of R for Data Science and Statistics, Justin Post. This course introduces participants to discrete choice models, econometric models of how people choose between discrete outcomes, such as mode of travel to work or type of treatment for pain. The course will cover the subset of discrete choice models known as random utility models. These models are often used in disciplines such as economics, transportation, and public health. No prior knowledge is expected, and the course will cover logistic regression, multinomial logistic regression, and nested logistic regression. Hands-on exercises will be conducted in R. 

• Introduction to Python, Laura Tateosian. Python is a consistently top ranking programming language. Python syntax is easy to learn and the language is well-suited for rapid data exploration, as well as larger data science projects. This course will help you add basic Python skills to your data science tool belt, so that you can then go on to explore some of the vast number of libraries written in Python. Learning Python is important for any aspiring data scientist. This course is designed for students with some prior exposure to computer programming, but no Python experience. Participants will be introduced to core Python elements for working with data.

The deadline for registration is March 8 for Monday/Tuesday courses and March 9 for Wednesday/Thursday courses.

Please let me know if you have any questions or if you need any additional information.

Best,

Jayasree

The Graduate School is pleased to announce that we are currently accepting nominations for the 2023 Faculty Award for Excellence in Graduate Student and Academic Program Support. The Faculty Award for Excellence in Graduate Student and Academic Program Support recognizes graduate faculty currently in the Director of Graduate Studies role, who provide outstanding support for graduate programs and their students. 

The criteria for this award are as follows: 

• Program Support
• Engaging in critical and thoughtful discussions regarding program improvement, resource allocation, and student advising and mentoring
• Cultivating and contributing to a climate of inclusion and support for faculty, students, and staff from diverse backgrounds with varied experiences
• Student Development
• Providing students with constructive feedback and thoughtful guidance in dealing with academic challenges, defining professional goals, and accessing relevant resources
• Helping students develop a sense of voice, agency, and community within their academic program and ultimately their disciplinary field
• Faculty Engagement
• Working with program faculty and staff to ensure clear and consistent communication, interpretation, and application of policies and procedures
• Promoting faculty consideration and discussion of student concerns and ideas as related to program expectations and needs

The nomination process is as follows:

• A letter no longer than 500 words, prepared by graduate students, and commenting on the nominee’s abilities in the relevant criteria areas. This nomination may be submitted by a single student or a group of students.
• One letter that expresses faculty support for the nomination from the program director or chair. 
• Two additional letters of support may be submitted with the nomination. These letters can come from a student services manager and/or another campus representative (outside The Graduate School).
• A nomination packet should be submitted to me through Qualtrics consisting of: 
• Student nomination
• Faculty letter of support
• Up to two additional letters of support
• All graduate students are invited to nominate current Directors of Graduate Studies for this award.

The nomination form can be found at Faculty Award for Excellence in Graduate Student and Academic Program Support- The Graduate School at UNC-Chapel Hill.

The deadline for nominations is March 10, 2023 at 5pm. Please do not hesitate to contact Lou Anne Phelps with any questions. We look forward to receiving your nominations!

The 25th Annual Graduate Student Recognition Celebration will be Wednesday, April 12 at 4 pm in the Gorge Watts Hill Alumni Center.