Amy Hammett is responsible for the automation of Understanding Ag, LLC. Her expertise is in interdisciplinary big data science translation and in STEM workforce development.
A small family farmer, a veteran science teacher, and 20-year data scientist, Amy has translated big data with and for stakeholders at the local, state, regional, and federal levels and has developed some of the machine learning and artificial intelligence methodologies in use across industries and institutions today. Advocating for data-driven decisions, Amy spent about a year as a big data consultant for Microsoft and USDA, working with Ag industries and academic institutions and with Future Farmers of America (FFA) and Center for Agriculture Science Education (CASE) to integrate data technologies across all sectors and industries. She also launched a nationwide Data Science Education (DSE) initiative with Education leaders across multiple national STEM Education organizations in 2018. Advocating for workforce development and redundant big data systems development to ensure checks and balances in our free market system, she came to Understanding Ag after initiating the workforce development programs of the Governor of Alabama’s AL STEM Council and serving as the Director of Regional and National Collaborations for the Alabama Water Institute of the University of Alabama. In these roles, she built private and public collaborations around regenerative agriculture, sustainable urban agriculture, smart forestry, aquaculture, public and ecosystem health, climate-smart energy systems, and global water security.
Amy has also planned and advised the development of other interdisciplinary machine learning and artificial intelligence systems to harness solutions to national and global challenges in hydrology, biology, energy, healthcare, seismology, space, supply chain, and atmospheric systems, including the modeling of atmospheric rivers for flash drought and flood prediction, which she proposed to over 200 Agriculture and hydrology leaders at the USDA NIFA-sponsored Ogallala Aquifer Summit in 2021, when she was invited by summit leaders to present on Next Generation workforce development. A focus of her work today is supporting the consultants of Understanding Ag in their work with producers and ranchers to increase water infiltration on their farms and ranches in order to mitigate flash drought and flooding and restore agricultural and ecosystem function. She also supports local, regional, and national education leaders who are catalyzing workforce development efforts across the United States and globally, working to restore the food and water security of the Nation and its allies.
