Computer Information Systems Department Guiding Students Toward Career Success

Computer Information Systems Department Guiding Students Toward Career Success

January 12, 2026

As employers increasingly seek graduates who can demonstrate real-world, job-ready experience, Baruch College continues to emphasize career-focused teaching. The latest example comes from the Paul H. Chook Department of Information Systems and Statistics at the Zicklin School of Business who hosted its first-ever CIS 3120 Demo Day, organized by Professors Radhika Jain, Sonyl Nagale, and Vinayak Javaly.

The December event gave students in the Programming for Analytics course a chance to take what they learned in the classroom and put it into practice-presenting their work in a public setting while sharpening their communication skills.

Closing the Gap between Classroom and Workplace

"Demo Day was an experiment bringing our department together across four sections allowing students to showcase their classwork to a wider audience and bridge the gap between the classroom and the workplace," explained Dr. Javaly.

Nearly 60 students-across 16 teams-presented group projects to peers and faculty, including department Chair Nanda Kumar. To complete their work, students accessed application programming interfaces for Citi Bike and NYC Restaurant Health Inspection, as well as data that tracks movies, weather, food nutrition, and restaurant food delivery. The students developed creative visualizations such as line charts, pie graphs, heat maps, and scatter plots highlighting their technical decisions and then shared their conclusions.

Throughout the event, attendees circulated among project demonstrations asking questions, and engaged students in discussions about design decisions, challenges, and potential improvements. This interactive format mirrored real-word scenarios such as client meetings or project reviews, encouraging students to think critically, respond to feedback, and refine ideas in real time settings.

Career-Focused Pedagogy at Baruch

Baruch College is expanding career-focused teaching across disciplines, helping students graduate with both academic knowledge and workplace-ready skills. The Starr Career Development Center-working in collaboration with the Center for Teaching and Learning-plays a central role in this effort by supporting faculty as they integrate career readiness into courses of all sizes and formats.

Starr's Career Focused Pedagogy Brightspace Site won the 2025 Alva C. Cooper Award for Technology, as the website supports the College's efforts to "promote excellence in research and impact teaching" and "strengthen a collaborative and engaged community" by fostering pedagogical innovation and offering professional development opportunities for faculty and staff.

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