Get ready for an exciting and challenging experience at the 6th annual 2023 Illini Datathon! Hosted by the Department of Statistics in partnership with Synchrony and Sandia National Labs, this event will be held on March 24-26, 2023 at the Campus Instructional Facility (start time pending). Whether you're an individual or part of a team, everyone is welcome to register and join us for a weekend of data-driven problem solving and learning. Enjoy the delicious food provided, network with industry professionals and receive guidance from experienced mentors. With workshops, networking opportunities and prizes up for grabs, the 2023 Illini Datathon is not one to be missed!

Registration Deadline is March 3, 2023! Join the competition and showcase your skills at the weekend-long datathon. Assemble a team and tackle an engaging data-related challenge by cleaning data, constructing models, visualizing results, and interpreting outcomes. The datathon will test your knowledge in a variety of areas such as time series, survival analysis, and statistical learning. Train, test, and evaluate multiple data sets to uncover your solutions for your chance to win big and gain some bragging rights!

Registration Details

Teams of four will compete against other teams from statistics, mathematics, computer science, and other disciplines to conquer the weekend. Individuals are permitted to register as individuals and will be assigned to a team after registration is completed. 

Team captains are responsible for registering their entire team for the competition. Captains will register the team name, and provide the names, emails, and degrees of the other team members. Teams need a minimum of three (3) in order to register, less than that, each person will need to register as an individual. Teams with less than four (4) competitors at the end of register will be assigned individual registrants at random to complete their teams. 

Other Details

Leading up to the 2023 Illini Datathon, the Department of Statistics will be hosting a skill check workshop for participants to gain insight and details on the best way to solve related problem sets. 

The official problem and dataset will be provided at the kick-off event on Friday, March 24 at the Campus Instructional Facility. Mentors from Synchrony, Sandia, and the Department of Statistics will be on hand to help work through the problem to keep you on track. Workshops and networking events will be held throughout the day on March 25. The competition will conclude on March 26 (time pending). Teams will turn in their solutions and visualizations to the judges. An awards ceremony will be held in the afternoon of March 26!

Final Results

Problem Statement: In the financial industry, credit charge offs are a crucial metric to measure as they directly impact the health of the institution. A charge off occurs when a customer fails to make payment and eventually is written off as a loss. With that, it is increasingly important for banks to accurately forecast their charge offs in order to make informed decisions for the future.

Based on customer and macroeconomic data, forecast an accurate number of monthly charge offs over the period of February 2020 thru January 2021.

View the winning teams presentations:

Top 3 Overall:

1st place: Raining
2nd place: Attack on Data
3rd place: Random Seed

Best Visualization: Team Jason