Dr Mariam Adedoyin-Olowe

Biography

Prior to joining BCU, I was a Lecturer at the Bells University in Nigeria. I also ran Student Mentor and Education Services Outfit - Insight Mentors and Education Services, Nigeria, where I was the Lead Mentor/Education Consultant.

Academic history and expertise

I graduated from the University of Portsmouth in 2010 as an international student and went on to earn my doctorate degree from Robert Gordon University. I’ve published several academic papers in the field of Data Mining and Data Analytics. Currently, I’m currently a Lecturer in Data Analytics and Research Methods and Project Management in the School of Computing and Digital Technology. I am also a researcher in the field of Data Mining, Data Analytics, Data Science, Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence.

I also currently supervise BSc, MSc and PhD students and serve as an Internal and external examiner at PhD viva. I am also a paper reviewer for several renown academic conferences and journal articles. I am a Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy and have completed the Aurora Women’s Leadership Development Programme.

In the early part of my PhD program, which I initially started at the University of Portsmouth, I was also employed by the University in collaboration with Portsmouth City Council to mentor Year 11 and college students in High Schools and Colleges around Portsmouth to prepare them for further education in the University. I did this for two years until transferring my PhD research program to Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen, Scotland.

My PhD research applied data mining techniques to social networks data to detect and track topic/event from real life occurrences for information and decision making. My research interest includes:

•        Social Media Analysis
•        Artificial Intelligence
•        Machine learning
•        Text mining (Sentiment Analysis)

In 2020, I collaborated with BIT student in the School of Computing to investigate and develop a Data Mining Model for the management of self-checkout tills at Co-op, England stores. The project involved the assessment of the different point-of-sales (PoS) system and how they can potentially fit the Co-op business model and improve their customer experience.

BCU achievements

I have achieved several accomplishments since arriving at BCU over five years ago. I have been part of MSc AI course development, a course that has won over fifty scholarships from the Office for Students (OfS) to date. I have developed curriculums and module content and I have also supervised over fifteen MSc projects and over twenty undergraduate research and industry-mentored projects. I have one PhD supervision completion as the Director of Study and currently supervise two PhD students in the School of Computing as a second supervisor. 

I was nominated for an I AM BCU "Inspirational Teacher of the Year" award in 2022. However, I live vicariously through my student community, one of which won the Best Final Year Project in her course in 2020. Another of my Final Year Project student won the first runner up for Best Final Year Project in Computer and Data Science during the BCU acclaimed Innovation Fest of 2022. The student went on to receive five different offers from BCU partner industries and an offer to commercialise the app developed in his final project.

Working at BCU

My favourite thing about working at the University is that you are trusted with independence and given the power to innovate. This was the way to get the best out of me and I am glad my centre lead saw that immediately and was able to bring the best out of me. I was given free reign to explore and take ownership of my module as the module leader right from when I joined BCU. I was surrounded with vibrant academics who became and are still good friends and colleagues.

The work is exceptionally distinct and keeps me innovating time after time. I am a multiple Erasmus+ scholar and through the exchange programme, I have visited the University of Ibadan, Nigeria three times where I trained and completed workshops and seminar with academics and students in attendance.