• Charles Sturt University in Wagga Wagga to host international data science conference on Thursday 1 and Friday 2 December

International data scientists will explore climate change, floods, cybersecurity and hacking issues when they converge at Charles Sturt University in Wagga Wagga next week for their annual conference.

The 45^th annual conference of the Australia and New Zealand Regional Science Association International (ANZRSAI) will be held at the University in Wagga Wagga on Thursday 1 and Friday 2 December.

Conference organiser Associate Professor in Mathematics and Statistics Azizur Rahman (pictured, inset) in the Charles Sturt School of Computing, Mathematics and Engineering is the Convenor of the conference, and Chairs the Conference Organising committee and the Scientific Program Committee.

“The conference is a significant event concerning regional issues, and this year the conference’s core theme is ‘Data Science in Regional Policy: Housing and workforce dynamics’,” Professor Rahman said.

“The conference will cover a wide range of contemporary topics, including regional floods, impacts of the climate changes, cybersecurity and hacking issues, such as what recently happened with Optus and Medibank, as well as regional policy debates and issues such as sustainable development."

The overall conference program comprises six keynotes – three invited talks, one roundtable discussion and three parallel sessions with other conference activities. The ANZRSAI’s Annual General Meeting (AGM) will also be held at this event.

Professor Rahman said academics, researchers and students from national and international universities in Australia, New Zealand, Japan, UK, Ireland, Bangladesh and elsewhere will attend, as well as from Charles Sturt.

“The conference will provide students with many opportunities, including learning about contemporary research issues related to regional development and data science, research methods and data analysis tools and techniques, and they will gain skills from experts’ presentations,” Professor Rahman said.

“They will also benefit from getting feedback on their research projects, interacting with external peers, academics, professionals from industries and decision makers from governments.

“Importantly, they will also enjoy our University’s hospitality and its beautiful carbon neutral campus.”

Two awards will be presented at the conference – the award for the ‘Best Paper presented at the conference’ and the award for the ‘Best Paper presented by a student’.

Charles Sturt Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic) Professor Graham Brown will open the conference, and Senator the Hon. Bridgit McKenzie, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development, will attend the event.

See further details about this conference.