Prof. Dennis Sun appointed new Associate Professor (Teaching)

We are thrilled to welcome Prof. Dennis Sun, who returned to Stanford in January to become Associate Professor (Teaching) of Statistics! Since receiving his Ph.D. from Stanford in 2015 under the advising of Prof. Jonathan Taylor, he most recently has been Associate Professor of Statistics and Affiliate Professor of Computer Science at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, and a Senior Data Scientist at Google.
Prof. Sun was recognized for his teaching multiple times during his previous Stanford career. In addition to receiving the Statistics Departmental Teaching Award in 2014, the university selected him for its highest teaching award, the 2014 Walter J. Gores Award for Excellence in Teaching. The citation referenced his "innovative teaching that makes statistics fun, even for the most skeptical of students." He also was commended "for his drive to improve the learning experience and for the transformational impact he has had on how statistics is taught at Stanford."
Prof. Sun lists statistical software, statistics education, data science, and audio signal processing among his research interests, with a focus on making statistics and data science more accessible by improving the way in which ideas are taught and communicated and by developing software tools to assist practitioners with existing methods. In addition to his research in statistics education and software, Prof. Sun also collaborates with researchers in the fields of music and public health.
Prof. Sun will serve as a faculty advisor for students pursuing the Data Science B.S. This quarter, he is also teaching a new course, DATASCI 112: Principles of Data Science. Please join us in welcoming Prof. Sun to the Data Science community!
Special thanks to the Statistics Department for much of the content of this article.