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Mathematics Graduate Mining Big Data at Stanford
By Dr. Tom Brown
Juan Banda (MA 07) was born and raised in Chihuahua, Mexico. From an early age Juan loved computers. In Mexico, Juan attended the Universidad Autonoma de Chihuahua majoring in computer science and at the same time started a software company. Since Juan had family members who received advanced degrees in the United States, he decided to attend ENMU through the Consortium for North American Higher Education Collaboration (CONAHEC) exchange program.
Juan came to ENMU in 2004 as an undergraduate student in computer science. Juan commented, “I came from a university with over 2,000 students in the computer science department alone. I felt that ENMU was just the right size so I could make an impact on the community and be noticed by my professors. In such a small and tightknit community, I felt lucky to have great mentors and be able to provide mentoring for younger students as well. I also remember that my professors always had time to answer my questions.”
In 2005, Juan began his graduate work in mathematics at ENMU, serving as both a graduate teaching assistant and a resident advisor. Juan recalls both experiences as “very rewarding, an opportunity to experience a full range of people and an opportunity to make an impact in their lives.”
After graduating from ENMU, Juan pursued a Ph.D. in computer science from Montana State University, which he completed in 2011. Currently Juan is a post-doc at Stanford University’s School of Medicine where he applies large-scale data mining techniques for information retrieval on unstructured text data from electronic health records. Juan commented “my time as a mathematics graduate student at ENMU helped me to deal with new challenges in my life such as changing from astroinformatics to biomedical informatics or switching fields from computer science to mathematics.”
The CONAHEC Student Exchange Program provides an opportunity for students to study abroad at partner universities, while paying tuition to their home institution. The visiting CONAHEC students at ENMU for the fall 2014 semester originate from the following countries: South Korea, Mexico, Spain and Brazil. ENMU has additionally sent students to study in South Korea, Finland and Spain. More information regarding the CONAHEC program can be found at conahecstudentexchange.org. ENMU students interested in studying abroad through CONAHEC should contact the Office of International Student Advising at international.advisor@enmu.edu
