U.S. Army Yuma Proving Ground (YPG) has been at the forefront of developing the local architecture and establishing data governance for practical use cases for artificial intelligence (AI) in support of the post’s test mission. To facilitate this, YPG has pioneered an introductory course in data management that recently graduated its second cohort.

Data is in a very real sense the chief product of test centers within the Army Test and Evaluation Command (ATEC).

U.S. Army Yuma Proving Ground (YPG) has been at the forefront of developing the local architecture and establishing data governance for practical use cases for artificial intelligence (AI) in support of the post’s test mission.

From vision-based AI learning to automating Kineto Tracking Mount-calibration processes, YPG is already reaping dividends from the most recent technology, and more benefits are expected as the impact of the efficiency gains continues. To facilitate this, YPG has pioneered an introductory course in data management that recently graduated its second cohort.

Whether data from tests of military equipment or business data like equipment lifecycles and utilization rates, the ability to read, analyze, and communicate with data in a critical way is vital for YPG’s operations.

“The folks are taking away the framework of what data literacy is,” said Richard Hernandez, YPG’s Chief Data Officer. “Hopefully they can take it and apply it to their daily operations and have enough information and the right context to move forward with data problems they encounter.”

People taking the class ran the gamut from engineers and data scientists to Operations Research Analysts. Spanning two full workdays, the course gives an overview of the Army’s overall digital modernization efforts and the ATEC data mesh before exploring practical use cases that occurred locally at YPG. Some of the course’s instructors attended an Army-wide data management class at West Point early this year, then made substantial modifications to discuss practical application of the precepts relevant to YPG’s specialized mission. In small group exercises during the two-day course, each group was encouraged to pursue problems relevant to their individual jobs and commodity areas.

“We want them to drive their own exercises in the sense of defining their own data set,” said Hernandez. “It helps them relate to the material and think about how their challenges can be approached using the concepts outlined in the course.”

Students in the class came from a wide variety of commodity areas and found the exercises fruitful.

“We’ve been going over statistical analysis and how it relates to our test mission areas,” said Rob Fillinger, a test officer in the Ground Combat Division. “We also talked about artificial intelligence and machine learning to streamline those processes even further. I think it’s going to be useful for us.”

The course will run monthly for the next few months but may become quarterly based on enrollment.

“We’ll continuously tailor content in future iterations of the course to make sure we’re hitting the points folks are asking us to outline for them,” said Hernandez.