Two Hunter-trained CUNY doctoral students won big at a recent datathon for prospective quantitative PhD — with one saying his success owed to his use of new computers at Hunter.
Physics student Joe Yin and Computer Science student Yuwen Yu were on a team that won third place at the highly competitive Schonfeld Early Engagement Summit, an annual contest challenging teams to create machine-learning models for predicting stock returns. Teams were given five hours to build Artificial Intelligence models using Python programming language, along with $10 million in virtual funds to use for trades.
Six teams of students hailing from 25 universities participated in the competition, which is sponsored by Schonfeld Strategic Advisors, a hedge fund.
Yin thanked Hunter Chief Information Security Officer Michael D’Amico and Director of Media Services and Capital Projects Stephen Sukhra for their support.
“The new monitors and computers provided by the Hunter College IT Department in January 2024, replacing end of life equipment, were instrumental in enhancing my productivity during the event in April 2024,” Yin wrote in a note. “This is one of the key reasons I was confident in my chances of winning.”
Yin’s thesis covers AI in computational biomedical imaging.
Yu, who worked in financial technology before joining the Graduate Center’s Computer Science doctoral program, credited her adviser for her success.
“I’d like to thank Hunter Professor Sarah Ita Levitan,” Yu said. “She is always supportive, and having the opportunity to attend and win the competition would not have been possible without her mentorship and encouragement.”
