Embracing Data Science

Abstract: Statistics is running the risk of appearing irrelevant to today's undergraduate students. Today's undergraduate students are familiar with data science projects and they judge statistics against what they have seen. Statistics, especially at the introductory level, should take inspiration from data science so that the discipline is not seen as somehow lesser than data science. This article provides a brief overview of data science, outlines ideas for how introductory courses could take inspiration from data science, and provides a reference to materials for developing stand-alone data science courses.