UC Berkeley spreads the gospel of data science with new college, free curriculum

They comb through troves of legal records and video evidence to challenge wrongful convictions. They organize medical data to help personalize health treatments for better care. They scrutinize school test scores to investigate inequities. Finding safe drinking water is easier thanks to an analysis tool they created.

UC Berkeley’s faculty and students are marshaling the vast power of data science across myriad fields to address tough problems. And now the university is set to accelerate those efforts with a new college, its first in more than 50 years — and is providing free curriculum to help spread the gospel of data science to California community colleges, California State University and institutions across the nation and world.

As data floods society faster than ever before, demand has surged for specialists who can organize and analyze it with coding skills, computing prowess and creative thinking.

To meet the “insatiable demand,” as university officials put it, UC Berkeley will open a College of Computing, Data Science and Society. The University of California Board of Regents is expected to approve the plan Thursday, following approval by its Academic and Student Affairs Committee on Wednesday.

—Los Angeles Times

Supreme Court dismisses challenges to the Section 230 legal shield that protects websites

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed a major challenge to the legal shield known as Section 230 that has protected websites from being sued for what users post there.

In a short unsigned opinion, the court said it would not rule on the potentially momentous issue because the plaintiffs who sued had no valid claims that Twitter or Google had aided terrorists, which was the foundation of the lawsuit.

The outcome is likely to yield a sigh of relief from the websites that have grown and prospered thanks to protections set by Congress at the dawn of the internet.

“This is a huge win for free speech on the internet,” said NetChoice Litigation Center Director Chris Marchese. “The court was asked to undermine Section 230 — and declined.”

—Los Angeles Times

In Miami, NATO official says only Ukraine can decide what ‘just and lasting peace’ would look like

Even as several countries have offered to mediate in the search for a political solution to the war in Ukraine, including several in Latin America, a high-ranking North Atlantic Treaty Organization official insists that only the Ukrainian government can determine what it will consider “a just and lasting peace.”

In an interview with the Miami Herald and el Nuevo Herald during a visit to Miami this week, the Deputy Assistant Secretary-General for Public Diplomacy at NATO, Carmen Romero, said that helping Ukraine to recover territory occupied by Russia would allow the Ukrainian government to come to the negotiating table with a stronger hand.

A former journalist with extensive diplomatic experience as a former NATO spokesperson, Romero avoided criticizing comments by Latin American presidents and officials who have downplayed Russia’s actions.

But she said the United Nations Charter condemns the use of violence against a neighboring country.

—Miami Herald