Deere and Company will help a local college start a new degree program. On Wednesday, Augustana announced a $1.5 million grant from the John Deere Foundation will establish an endowed chair for data analytics.
The college applied for the grant earlier this year.
Public Relations Director Sam Schlouch says students are looking forward to taking courses in the growing field.
"We do know that there is an interest in this sort of field. We know that there are a lot of good jobs out there for our graduates working with big data, so we know that there is demand from employers."
Over the next two years, The Bureau of Labor Statistics expects the demand for data analysts to grow by 1.5 million.
Schlouch says Augustana plans to introduce a data analytics minor that will supplement courses in business, economics, and pubic health in 2018. It plans to introduce the major by 2020.
