The University of Arkansas at Little Rock Donaghey College of Engineering and Information Technology (EIT) has received a $52,000 gift to fund two graduate assistantships in the Information Quality Graduate Program from PiLog Academy, a group that has been a long-time supporter of EIT.

PiLog Academy is a subsidiary of PiLog Group that focuses on education, training, and research activities. The Academy was established to foster education and research in master data quality and the promotion of ISO 8000 data quality standards, the global standard for data quality and enterprise master data.

PiLog CEO Salomon de Jager, an affiliate member of the UA Little Rock graduate faculty, and several members of his senior technical staff are active participants in the EIT OYSTER Open Source Entity Resolution system research project.

“The primary business success of the PiLog Group has been its development and deployment of master data quality solutions,” Dr. de Jager said. “The Fourth Industrial Revolution has been driven by digital technologies and the management of quality data from global data sources. Unlocking the power of data and information has become the cornerstone of a successful business.”

The PiLog Group was a sponsor of the MIT International Conference on Information Quality hosted by the UA Little Rock Information Science Department in October 2017, and the PiLog Academy has provided teaching materials and online access to software in support of the UA Little Rock Information Quality Graduate Program.

“PiLog Academy’s generosity allows UA Little Rock to offer quality assistantships in which students can engage and become equipped to tackle real-world solutions by pursuing research and data initiatives,” said Christian O’Neal, vice chancellor for university advancement.

The assistantships are designed to support the academic pursuit of research and development in Information Quality, specialize in areas of master data quality management  and entity resolution, and further PiLog’s ongoing sponsorship and collaboration with the university’s Information Quality Graduate Program. Preference for awardees of the assistantship will be given to qualified students from South Africa.

“The PiLog Group and PiLog Academy recognize UA Little Rock’s global leadership in Information and Data Quality education and research,” Dr. de Jager said. “We strongly believe that the PiLog commercial solutions are enriched by the research and graduates coming from the UA Little Rock Information Quality Graduate Program. Continuing advances in the data and information technology will be the key to future success and for educating and training the leadership needed to sustain this dynamic field. We trust our sponsorship will help ensure a continuing partnership and sustained interaction for the benefit of both PiLog and the University.