Students explore hands-on projects and internships

By Jacob deNobel

Data science & baseball

The use of AI may be frowned upon for most college classes, but in Goucher’s Introduction to Machine Learning, it’s the name of the game.

In the course, students use machine learning to examine various forms of datasets. For recent data science graduate Alee Marschke ’24, the class was an opportunity to incorporate one of her favorite forms of data—baseball statistics.

Marschke was interested in seeing if machine learning could be useful in predicting MLB batting averages, a highly sought-after metric useful in understanding player performances.

She began to analyze Orioles player data from 2017 to 2022 through a new machine-learning technique called a probabilistic Bayesian neural network. As Marschke describes it, while a standard neural network features a singular input and output, a Bayesian neural network outputs a distribution of values to provide a ballpark estimate for a prediction with a certain level of confidence.

Following her research, Marschke found that the probabilistic Bayesian neural network had a lower Mean Absolute Error than a standard neural network, suggesting its success in predicting future seasons’ batting average outcomes.

A baseball fan since middle school, Marschke began analyzing data in the sport after a high school teacher introduced her to sabermetrics, the empirical study of baseball, born out of the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR). Marschke said that she was drawn to studying data due to the breadth of opportunities it offered.

“As someone who had an interest in many subjects, I loved the versatility of data applications,” Marschke said. “Through data, I could be connected to many topics and fields, from sports to finance to biology.”

Marschke became a student member of SABR in the summer of 2022 after the organization brought its annual conference to Baltimore. She has submitted an article based on the project to SABR’s Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning Committee newsletter.

In April, she was invited to present her project, “Fielding Uncertainty: Using Probabilistic Bayesian Neural Networks to Predict MLB Batting Averages,” at the University of Connecticut Sports Analytics Symposium. She said it was an incredible experience and meeting other students with a shared interest in sports analytics was exciting.

Her work won her the Marian M. Torrey Prize in Integrative Data Analytics for 2024. Following this home run, she’s currently pursuing a job in data science.

 

The Goucher podcast

The final episode of a new Goucher podcast opens with three siblings meeting for brunch and discussing the state of the world. Their world, that is—Mars.

The Martian siblings relay the gossip they’ve heard that Mars is about to be colonized by a violent species with a dying home world, humans.

So begins Human Invasion, an original radio play written by Kristen Wheeler ’24 for Goucher’s new series, Goucher College Radio Theater Listens to the Environment.

The podcast, born out of Goucher’s Repertoire Theater course, consists of six radio plays based on environmental themes. In addition to Wheeler’s original piece, the other five plays are adapted from Climate Change Theatre Action, a worldwide festival of short plays about the climate crisis. The plays range from current-day dramas to far-flung science fiction epics, but of them all circle back to dealing with the issues of climate change.

The class’s five students were tasked with dividing up and reading all 30 plays from last year’s festival and selecting the ones that would make for the best radio adaptations. Once the plays were picked, students were assigned to each play as producers. Then production began.

Producers were responsible for editing their scripts, recruiting and auditioning actors, directing line readings in Goucher’s new audio studio, and giving feedback on the final mix, with each play featuring extensive sound effects and an original audio score.

According to Theatre Professor Michael Curry, who is producing the podcast alongside Theatre Associate Professor Allison Campbell, they put out the call to Goucher’s music students to help produce a few short pieces for the play.

“I thought one or two might show up and help do some composing,” Curry said. “We ended up with a half-dozen students who all decided to write and record live music for the shows.”

Between the actors, musicians, producers, and graphic designers, this project has expanded beyond the classroom to include work from about 30 Goucher students in total. Wheeler said that their creative input was eagerly sought for each episode.

“I told Michael that I had an interest in playwriting. He gave me a challenge to write a play,” Wheeler said. “I came back having written four in one week.”

Clare Sorensen ’27, a first-year student producing the play Apology, My, said she didn’t know what to expect when her teachers announced they would be doing radio plays instead of conventional theater. Soon, though, she took to the challenges of the form.

“I’ve generally been on the tech side of theater,” Sorensen said. “But this is a whole new experience. It’s been really enjoyable finding sound effects and directing actors. Doing the producer work has really helped expand my technical expertise.”

 

The business of human resources

When Jazmine Moreno-Garcia ’24 was offered an internship in the human resources department of the Kennedy Krieger Institute, she wasn’t sure if it was the right fit for her.

Moreno-Garcia had known she wanted to study business from the moment she stepped onto the Goucher campus. After her first week, she declared a major in business management and started working toward her dreams. She didn’t know if an HR internship at a health services organization like Kennedy Krieger would support that.

“I didn’t really think that HR was business-related,” Moreno-Garcia said. “The only thing I knew about HR was employee relations because that’s the only time I’d interact with it.”

But still, she accepted the internship after running it by her professor, David Grossman, associate professor of international business and marketing. He thought there could be a good opportunity there. It turns out he was right.

Moreno-Garcia found that the people she worked most closely with all had business or finance degrees. She also began to see the work that HR does beyond employee relations. She worked on technology like Kennedy Krieger’s HRIS systems and with a new program in their immigration department.

Prior to her internship, Moreno-Garcia worked for Kennedy Krieger in the patient access department, so she was able to provide feedback on their new computer systems from the perspective of an employee who would eventually have to use it.

Her experience as an employee also gave her a distinct perspective to advocate for in leadership meetings.

“For multiple projects, I was able to give leaders another point of view,” Moreno-Garcia said. “One example was trying to help them reach people throughout the institute, given that everyone here has a different schedule. It’s easy for a nine-to-five employee to attend a conference, but if you work inpatient, your hours aren’t that predictable.”

Her interest in business traces back to her family. Her father works as a contractor, and her sister handles his accounting and admin work. Her sister, who also works in the finance department at Kennedy Krieger, is the one who originally connected her with the organization for her first job there.

Moreno-Garcia graduated in May and is currently waiting to hear if a job will open in Kennedy Krieger’s HR department to continue her work. In the fall, she plans to pursue finance work by enlisting in the Air Force Reserve.

 

The political organizer

Jeff Castro ’24 has long known that he wanted to go into politics. He was drawn to Goucher due to its proximity to Washington, DC, but it didn’t take long for the Baltimore political scene to capture his heart.

Since June 2023, Castro has worked on the political campaign of Zeke Cohen ’08, a Goucher graduate himself who is running for Baltimore City Council. Interviewed in May, two weeks before both Castro’s graduation and Cohen’s election, Castro said Baltimore will continue to have his heart.

“I thought of Baltimore originally as a way to get my foot in the door,” Castro said. “But I’ve fallen in love with Baltimore politics. It’s the ‘Smalltimore’ phrase. It’s been a revelation for me. Everyone you meet here is looking out for each other, and it’s like you can find a mutual friend with almost anyone you meet.”

Castro’s interest in politics began while taking an AP government and civics course. While still in high school, he soon found himself working on political campaigns in his home state of New Jersey.

While at Goucher, Castro worked as a campaign field organizer for Vince Andrews’ campaign for state delegate and won the role of student body president himself. As his junior year was coming to a close, he was connected to Cohen’s campaign by Associate Professor Nina Kasniunas, the chair of the Political Science Department at Goucher.

In the role, Castro works on voter outreach. He knocks on doors, makes phone calls, attends political events, and generally beats the streets for the campaign. He says that one of the things he loves about working on a campaign is the variety of tasks and situations he encounters every day.

“The joke is that on the team you have to be a Swiss army knife to do campaign work,” Castro said. “You can be in a tuxedo at a black-and-white event one day and the very next day be on a basketball court in 90 degrees for a community fundraiser.”

Castro is eager to continue his work in Baltimore and has eyes on participating in a U.S. Senate race in the future. He said his time on Cohen’s campaign has taught him the high-stakes nature of politics.

“Once you dive into the work you can see how something as simple as one conversation can end up leading to a slew of volunteers for the campaign,” Castro said. “Every interaction is important. Every voter counts. Every door counts. Every conversation counts.”