St. Albans Innovates with Data Science in Sports: Local Students and Baseball Team Benefit

At St. Albans, a new educational approach combines athletics with academics in a course taught by Mr. Bowman Dickson. His class, Data Science with R, focuses on sports analytics using the school's baseball team data to teach data visualization and analysis. This method enhances both the students' learning experience and the baseball team's performance.

Mr. Dickson's class uses R, a programming language, to analyze sports data. The students create dashboards that simplify complex data into clear visual formats. This skill is increasingly important in professional sports, where data analysis is crucial for assessing player performance and gaining competitive edges.

The partnership between the data science class and the baseball team started in 2023. The team began recording detailed data on pitch types, velocities, and outcomes. Initially, the raw data was challenging for coaches to understand. Mr. Dickson's class addressed this by transforming the data into user-friendly dashboards during their spring break.

These dashboards help coaches evaluate player performance and game strategies more effectively. Pitching Coach Jack Besser noted that the dashboards are particularly useful for comparing players and making real-time game decisions.

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