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A joint team from the UWI Five Islands and The UWI St. Augustine Campuses captured the first place in the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB) coordinated Growth and Resilience Dialogue Artificial Intelligence (AI) Data Challenge.

This team, comprising undergraduate and postgraduate students and lecturers, secured top marks from the judges for their AI Disaster Risk Smart Classifier (DRSmc).

With a focus on climate resilience as a service, the team’s targeted end users included emergency responders such as Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA); national disaster preparedness offices and local response units such as hospitals, firefighters and stakeholders in agriculture, tourism and insurance.

The team members were: Emilie Ramsahai, Jahfari Hazelwood, Letetia Addison, Kevan Rajaram, Ken Manohar, Kyle King and Telly George. Their work earned them the cash prize of US$10,000.

A team representing the University of the West Indies Five Islands Campus and the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, USA captured the second place. The application assessed tourism sustainability in the Eastern Caribbean from Polar Region Ice Melting to Sea Level Change to Rainfall.

The team members were: Ilenius Ildephonce, David Wang, Esahtengang Asonganyi, Fabian Betrand, Joel Blenman, Jianwu Chang, Karen Chen and Kelly Christian. They received an award of US$3,500.

The third place winner was Odion Hillocks, a Teacher from Saint Vincent and the Grenadines pursuing a Master of Science Data Science Student at the University of the West Indies St. Augustine Campus. His model sought to predict the monthly maximum temperature within an OECS territory. He received the cash prize of US$2,500.

Odessa Eli, a Data Science Consultant and Khern Toussaint, software engineer, were adjudged as the fourth place winner. They are nationals of the Commonwealth of Dominica residing in the USA. The two-member team pitched their Caribbean Climate App which sought to demonstrate the relationship between climate related variables in the Caribbean. They were awarded US$1,500.

The Growth and Resilience Dialogue AI Data Challenge was part of the 6th Growth and Resilience Dialogue, which was held from 6-7 April.

Director of Academic Affairs, Interim Head, School of Science, Computing and Artificial Intelligence, UWI, Five Islands Campus and Chair of the AI Data Challenge, Dr Curtis B. Charles note that the Data Challenge was “just the beginning”.

He said The Challenge aimed “to raise the consciousness of our region to the fact that we need to collect the data, because that is the only way we can make data driven decisions about how we continue to manage and mitigate and find solutions to the threats of global warming and climate change.”

In her remarks at the Closing Ceremony, Deputy Governor of the ECCB, Dr Valda Henry thanked the finalists. She said that in some cases, through their work, they were breaking ceilings, assuming that there were no boxes as they innovated to come up with solutions.

She further said: “The agenda to raise the profile and value of data science and other sciences is central to the newly formed ECCB Knowledge and Innovation Hub, being advanced in collaboration with other stakeholders. The GRD Climate Resilience AI Data Challenge is the Hub’s first of several initiatives that will be launched to benefit the region’s development and transformation agenda.”

The 6th Growth and Resilience Dialogue focused on addressing climate change challenges for the region’s energy, tourism and health sectors. The ECCB hosted the two-day event in collaboration with its partners: the OECS Commission, The World Bank and The University of the West Indies.

Click here for more information about the Growth and Resilience Artificial Intelligence Data Challenge.

Click below to view an interview with Director of Academic Affairs, Interim Head, School of Science, Computing and Artificial Intelligence, UWI, Five Islands Campus and Chair of the AI Data Challenge, Dr Curtis B. Charles