Carleton is going to offer up its mathematicians for outside clients seeking decision-making help.
The university’s new mathematical consulting centre opened Jan. 23 with an objective to test the university’s math talent outside of the classroom.
The Centre for Quantitative Analysis and Decision Support will enlist faculty, graduate students, and post-doctorates to help academic, private, and public sector clients solve problems using math and statistics.
The centre is a joint project between the Faculty of Science and the School of Mathematics and Statistics.
“What the centre does is help people uncover the evidence that’s hidden in data,” said Patrick Boily, manager and senior consultant at the centre.
He uses the example of a police department.
“If you want to save money, the best way is don’t put any police officers anywhere,” he said. “That’s going to cost you nothing.”
“Then there’s a solution where you have an officer on every street corner. But then every Canadian citizen would be a police officer.”
He said quantitative mathematics and statistics can help make decisions in this give and take between resources and objectives.
For $100-200, depending on the work and the client—academics are charged less, Boily said—the centre will identify the problem, consult with the client, and apply what he calls the “bread and butter” of statistical and mathematical analysis to make the data “sing.”
“I think the opportunity to be exposed to real-world problems that require [students] to think about what they’ve learned is an invaluable experience,” said Patrick Farrell, director of the School of Mathematics and Statistics.
“The whole notion of having a university in the nation’s capital, with all the industry we have here, and the government, and all the very interesting research that’s going on . . . it seemed like there should be an entity like this,” he said.
Carleton’s science dean Malcolm Butler agreed the centre is filling a need in Ottawa for quantitative analysis.
“There’s all sorts of issues which require quantitative analysis, and a lot of organizations are not equipped to deal with that,” he said.
“At the same time, organizations like Stats Canada may not be as active now with the changes in the long form census.”
The centre does not have a physical space, he said, but is centered around its approximately six active faculty members’ offices. He said it will grow as clients do.
Farrell said as the centre grows he would like it to offer workshops, courses on mathematics and statistics, and co-op and training opportunities for undergraduate and graduate students.
Boily said he wants the centre to raise the profile of mathematics and statistics.
“If the only math you’ve ever done is Grade 10 and 11, you would never in a million years think [this centre] could exist or be useful,” he said. “But once you’ve learned the language properly, then you can start having interesting conversations.”
“What we’re hoping to do [with the centre] is to say, ‘Hey look, we’re not just a bunch of people who factor polynomials.'”
