A team led by Aaron Pagoda ‘23 won the intermediate category at the inaugural Macaulay Honors Datathon in September. The datathon, organized in collaboration with the  Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), required students to solve real-world problems using MTA data and featured keynote speakers, interactive workshops and cash prizes. Fifteen teams competed and 25 professionals served as mentors and judges. 

Pagoda, with team members Mario Fernandez ‘27 and Daniel Lezzerzon ‘28 from Hunter College, focused on improving subway access for senior citizens. They analyzed MTA data to identify the stations most heavily used by older people, pinpointing where the MTA could prioritize maintenance. Participants had two days to form teams, choose a problem, work with massive data sets and produce a presentation that told a compelling story and recommended plausible solutions. 

Additional John Jay participants included Savannah Banton '28, Maya Ford '28, Bianca Kaminski '28, Xiang Li '28, Ryan Maca '28 and Rimsha Tahir '25, who competed in the datathon; Elizaveta Bakhtina '27, who served as the sponsorship committee and employer relations coordinator; and Dr. Fatma Najar, assistant professor in the Department of Computer Science, who mentored the students and led a data science workshop. The datathon was organized by Allen Hillery, a data and society lecturer at Macaulay Honors College.