On Saturday, April 5, LMU’s Department of Information Systems and Business Analytics (ISBA) hosted its third annual LMU Datathon, marking an exciting milestone: for the first time, graduate and undergraduate students from universities across Southern California were invited to join the competition.
A total of 130 students from 10 institutions – including UCLA, USC, Cal State Long Beach, UC San Diego, UC Irvine, UC Riverside, Chapman, Cal Poly Pomona, San Jose State, and Pepperdine – gathered at LMU’s Hilton Center for Business to compete for $10,400 in prize money.
Participants received datasets and real-world problem statements provided by Resolution Economics. Graduate students were challenged to analyze the gender wage gap, while undergraduates conducted a meal break analysis. With mentorship from ISBA faculty and professionals at Resolution Economics, students developed data-driven insights and presented their findings to a panel of industry judges from leading organizations, including Thumbtack, Fox, Currie & Brown, Salesforce, Cedars-Sinai, Willdan, Promoshop LA, ServiceNow, LMU, and Resolution Economics.
“This year’s datathon exemplified real-world impact – driving data talent through meaningful industry-academia collaboration,” said Ana Mangal, clinical associate professor of ISBA.
Graduate Division Winners:
1st Place – UCLA MSBA
Xinyu Wang, Siran Fan, Ziyue Cao, Jun Liu
2nd Place – LMU MSBA
Luis Otero, Xiomara Vidal Marquez, Savio Ragonesi, Ornella Darcyl Sorstayn
3rd Place – USC MSBA
Roxanne (Ruoxiao) Li, Joey Cindass, Wutthichai (Bingo) Upatising, Anh Tuyet (Snowy) To
Undergraduate Division Winners:
1st Place – LMU Statistics and Data Science
Naomi Alvarado, Vivek Dhingra, Maya Purandare, Cameron Hajaliloo
2nd Place – Cal State Long Beach
Hahnl Lo, Anna Kang, Phu Quach
“This was my second time participating, and I was honestly hesitant to compete again because I knew I was setting myself up for a big challenge,” said LMU MSBA student Xiomara Vidal Marquez. “But I left last year motivated to improve my skills. Our team worked well because we collaborated on everything – from exploration to modeling – and told a compelling story about the current state of gender equality.”
“Placing second still feels surreal,” added LMU MSBA student Luis Otero. “This datathon let me test my data science skills in a high-pressure setting and compete with students beyond LMU. I am grateful to CBA for organizing such a memorable event, as well as the MSBA faculty for teaching me the valuable technical and professional tools to help me grow in this competitive field.”
“The LMU Datathon has been a highlight of my experience in the MSBA program,” said Ornella Darcyl. “Working with real-world data and presenting our findings to industry professionals helped me grow not just as an analyst, but as a communicator who can reach audiences through data storytelling.”
For Vivek Dhingra, an LMU senior majoring in computer science and minoring in statistics and data science, seeing so many creative approaches to the same problem was one of the most rewarding experiences. “Winning the datathon helped with my confidence in the field – it can sometimes be difficult to grapple with impostor syndrome because of the competitiveness surrounding data science.”
This year’s LMU Datathon was made possible thanks to the generous support of Rob Crandall from Resolution Economics and the Komagome ISBA/MSBA Student Success Fund.
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