Data Science and Big Data Technology

Within 3 to 5 years after graduation from the DS program, the graduates are expected to:

• Further their intellectual growth through graduate education or professional development.
• Apply their creativity and global perspective in their engineering or non-engineering professions.
• Assume leadership roles in a variety of contexts.

Graduates from the DS program should be able to demonstrate:

1. an ability to identify, formulate, and solve complex engineering problems by applying principles of engineering, science, and mathematics
2. an ability to apply engineering design to produce solutions that meet specified needs with consideration of public health, safety, and welfare, as well as global, cultural, social, environmental, and economic factors
3. an ability to communicate effectively with a range of audiences
4. an ability to recognize ethical and professional responsibilities in engineering situations and make informed judgments, which must consider the impact of engineering solutions in global, economic, environmental, and societal contexts
5. an ability to function effectively on a team whose members together provide leadership, create a collaborative and inclusive environment, establish goals, plan tasks, and meet objectives
6. an ability to develop and conduct appropriate experimentation, analyze and interpret data, and use engineering judgment to draw conclusions
7. an ability to acquire and apply new knowledge as needed, using appropriate learning strategies

Candidates for the Bachelor of Science in DS must satisfactorily complete 122 credit hours required by the GC DS program, including:

• Engineering Foundation 38 credits 
• Program Subjects 38 credits
• Engineering Specialization 4 credits
• Academic Writing 4 credits
• Intellectual Breadth 14 credits
• Electives 24 credits:
• DS Applications Electives 8 credits
• Flexible Technical Electives 8 credits
• General Electives 8 credits
• Requirement of Experiential Learning
• Additionally, domestic Chinese students are also required to take all courses required by the Ministry of Education of China. International students are required to take 12 credits of Chinese language and culture courses.

Course requirements for each of the credit categories are listed below:

Engineering Foundation (38 credits)

• Calculus II – MATH1160J or Honors Calculus II – MATH1560J or Honors Mathematics II – MATH1860J (4)
• Calculus III – MATH2150J or Honors Calculus III – MATH2550J or Honors Mathematics III – MATH2850J (4)
• Calculus IV – MATH2160J or Honors Calculus IV – MATH2560J or Honors Mathematics IV – MATH2860J (4)
• Linear Algebra – MATH2140J or MATH4170J (4)
• Discrete Mathematics – MATH2030J (4)
• Introduction to Engineering – ENGR1000J (4)
• Introduction to Computer and Programming – ENGR1010J (4)
• Physics I – PHYS1400J or PHYS1500J or PHYS1600J (4)
• Physics II – PHYS2400J or PHYS2500J or PHYS2600J (4)
• Physics Lab I & II – PHYS1410J & PHYS2410J (2)

Program Subjects（38 credits)

• Programming & Elem. Data Structures – ECE2800J
• Data Structures and Algorithms – CS2810J
• Probabilistic Methods in Eng. – ECE4010J
• Applied Regression Analysis – STAT4130J
• Data Science and Analytics with Python – STAT4710J
• Introduction to Machine Learning – ECE4450J
• Big Data Security
• Database Management Systems – ECE4840J
• DS Capstone Design – DS4500J/(MDE)
• Tech Comm – TC3000J
• Professional Ethics – ENGR4960J

Engineering Specialization（4 credits）

Choose one of the following courses specific to an engineering field

• Design and Manufacturing I ME2500J, or
• Introduction to Logic Design ECE2700J, or

Academic Writing (4 credits)

• Academic Writing I – ENGL1000J

Intellectual Breadth (14 credits)

Intellectual Breadth education aims to equip engineering students with diverse modes of thinking and interdisciplinary knowledge beyond pure technical expertise. It seeks to provide essential contextual grounding for students’ future engineering practice, enabling them to understand human ideological paradigms, the structure and evolution of human society, patterns of human behavior and interaction, and the spiritual pursuits and creative expressions of humanity embodied in literature, art, and diverse cultural works.

Through interdisciplinary learning across multiple fields, students can fully comprehend the multifaceted impacts of engineering practices in global, economic, environmental and societal contexts. This comprehensive intellectual cultivation fosters flexible thinking, innovative consciousness, and cross-cultural and cross-group collaboration competencies, empowering students to become well-rounded, adaptable engineering professionals with social responsibility and holistic cognitive literacy.

To fully accommodate diverse, high-quality interdisciplinary courses that align with the talent cultivation philosophy of Intellectual Breadth, and to break the limitations of fixed course categories, this curriculum module covers established core disciplinary fields and reserves inclusive admission qualifications for eligible alternative courses. All students are required to complete a total of 14 credits of Intellectual Breadth coursework in accordance with the following standardized requirements:

Disciplinary Distribution & Credit Requirements (14 elective credits)

Students must complete 14 credits of interdisciplinary elective courses, covering humanities, social sciences, professional development, natural sciences, art, and other approved general intellectual breadth courses, with specific category credit requirements as follows:

• A minimum of 3 credits in Humanities
• A minimum of 3 credits in Social Sciences
• A maximum of 6 credits of language courses can be counted toward the Intellectual Breadth credit requirement
• Credits earned for Chinese language courses taken by international students beyond the required Chinese language courses may be counted toward this 6-credit language limit, subject to the same cap.
• A minimum of 2 credits in Aesthetic literacy coursework，which may be fulfilled in two ways with distinct credit counting rules:
• Art courses listed under the Intellectual Breadth Art subcategory will count directly toward Intellectual Breadth credits.
• General art courses (including university-wide Chinese-taught art courses) can satisfy the aesthetic literacy requirement but will not count toward Intellectual Breadth credits; these credits will be applied to General Electives instead. Students are permitted to satisfy the full 2-credit aesthetic literacy requirement through general art courses and are not required to take courses from the Intellectual Breadth Art subcategory.

Course Category Specifications

• Humanities: Includes but is not limited to Philosophy, English Language and Literature, Asian Languages and Culture, American Culture, Comparative Literature, Film Studies, and other humanistic courses that explore human ideology, culture and spiritual connotation.
• Social Sciences: Includes but is not limited to International and Comparative Studies, Political Science, Asian Studies, Economics, Environmental Studies, History, and other courses that study social operation, institutional development and human social behaviors.
• Professional Development: Includes but is not limited to Engineering Ethics, Business Studies, Entrepreneurship Studies, and other courses that support students’ professional growth, career development and comprehensive competency improvement.
• Natural Sciences: Includes Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Astronomy, Earth Sciences, and other basic science courses that cultivate scientific thinking and explore natural laws.
• Art: Covers various art appreciation, art creation, aesthetic theory and related practical courses that cultivate aesthetic literacy and creative thinking.
• Other General Intellectual Breadth Courses (upon approval): To enrich the curriculum system and fully recognize high-quality interdisciplinary learning outcomes, other courses that conform to the core philosophy of Intellectual Breadth, break through pure technical training, and help expand students’ interdisciplinary vision, comprehensive thinking and social cognition can be included in this category after official review and approval. This flexible category covers all eligible courses that cannot be classified into the above fixed sub-disciplines but meet the college’s talent cultivation standards.

Major Design Experience:

All DS students are required to complete a Capstone Design course (DS4500J) or one of the Major Design Experience (MDE) courses from the list below.

ECE4270J VLSI Design I

ECE4410J App Development for Entrepreneurs

ECE4700J Computer Architecture

ECE4730J Advanced Embedded Systems

Courses in the above list can be counted as either an MDE course or a DS Application elective course, which is a choice of the student. However, a course can be used to satisfy the major design experience requirement only when it is taken in the senior year of a student. Note that some courses are not offered every semester.

Advanced DS Application Elective （8 credits）:

• STAT3060J – Computational Thinking with Data (Winter Program)
• STAT4060J – Computational Methods for Statistics and Data Science
• STAT4510J – Bayesian Analysis
• ECE4440J – Networks
• ECE4530J – Decision Making in Smart Cities
• ECE4711J – Applied Parallel Programming with GPUs
• DS4720J/DS4721J/ECE6701J – Methods and Tools for Big Data
• DS4760J – Data Mining
• DS4761J – Data Mining and Machine Learning
• ECE4770J – Introduction to Algorithms
• ECE4840J – Database Management Systems
• ECE4850J – Optimization in Machine Learning
• ECE4880J – Computer Vision
• ECE4920J – Introduction to Artificial Intelligence
• ECE4921J – Artificial Intelligence: Principles and Techniques
• ECE6702J – Problem Solving with AI Techniques
• ME4550J – Introduction to Data-driven Engineering Design
• ME4670J – Introduction to Robotics
• MATH4710J – Introduction to Numerical Methods
• ECE4270J VLSI Design I
• ECE4410J App Development for Entrepreneurs
• ECE4700J Computer Architecture
• ECE4730J Advanced Embedded Systems
• CS3610J Large Language Model
• CS3330J Agentic Software Engineering
• CS3310J Reinforcement learning

Flexible Technical Electives (8 credits):

The flexible technical elective requirement may be fulfilled by taking 300-level or higher courses in DS or in other engineering, biology, chemistry, mathematics, finance, and physics fields.  200-level courses that are specified in the following list can be counted as flexible technical electives.

Up to 6 credits of courses taken from other engineering or science departments of SJTU may be counted in this category but must be 300-level or higher. These courses must be approved by the DS Program Advisor.

Any credits in excess of 8 may be applied to the General Elective category.

200-level course list:

• ECE2150J – Introduction to Circuits
• ECE2160J – Introduction to Signals and Systems
• ECE2300J – Electromagnetics I
• ECE2700J – Introduction to Logic Design
• MSE2420J – Physics of Materials
• MSE2500J – Principles of Engineering Materials
• ME2110J – Introduction to Solid Mechanics
• ME2350J – Thermodynamics
• ME2400J – Introduction to Dynamics and Vibrations
• PHIL2800J – Ethics of AI

General Electives (8 credits):

General electives are intended to allow students to explore any dimension of intellectual endeavor that they elect, in both technical (including engineering) and non-technical fields. This requirement can be met by any course subject to the following restrictions:

• A maximum of 4 credits of research work (such as PRP, IPP, etc.) can be counted towards graduation.
• Students should select general elective courses to explore areas of their cultural interest or professional interest, such as:
• Management, business, or finance classes in preparation for working in industry.
• Classes to prepare for further study outside engineering such as medicine, dentistry, law or education.
• Additional language, literature or culture classes to prepare for a career in the global economy.
• Additional DS classes to go into more depth than what the limited technical electives allow.
• Engineering classes in other departments in preparation for graduate school outside DS.

Requirement of Experiential Learning:

the students need to fulfill the Experiential Learning requirement by having at least two experiences out of the following list:

• Scientific research (e.g., PRP, IPP, ENGR4901J/4902J/4903J, etc.)
• International experience
• Field-study experience
• Relevant professional internships (an official internship certificate upon completion is mandatory.)
• TA experience
• Relevant professional volunteer experience
• Other approved experience

For those experiences which are not formal courses, evidence should be provided and will be checked by the UEO.