The New Computational and Data Sciences Undergraduate Program at George Mason University

We describe the new undergraduate science degree program in Computational and Data Sciences (CDS) at George Mason University (Mason), which began offering courses for both major (B.S.) and minor degrees in Spring 2008. The overarching theme and goal of the program are to train the next-generation scientists in the tools and techniques of

cyber-enabled science (e-Science)

to prepare them to confront the emerging petascale challenges of data-intensive science. The Mason CDS program has a significantly stronger focus on data-oriented approaches to science than do most computational science and engineering programs. The program has been designed specifically to focus both on simulation (Computational Science) and on data-intensive applications (Data Science). New courses include Introduction to Computational & Data Sciences, Scientific Data and Databases, Scientific Data & Information Visualization, Scientific Data Mining, and Scientific Modeling & Simulation. This is an

interdisciplinary science

program, drawing examples, classroom materials, and student activities from a broad range of physical and biological sciences. We will describe some of the motivations and early results from the program. More information is available at http://cds.gmu.edu/.