Ibrahim Denis Fofanah

Data Scientist & AI Researcher

I'm Ibrahim Denis Fofanah, a data scientist working at the intersection of applied AI and the systems that decide people's opportunities. My research asks what happens to the people a system doesn't see. I originated the framework of Artificial Frictional Unemployment, which examines how AI-driven hiring systems create barriers between qualified candidates and the work they'd be good at. I've published three papers on arXiv, including the first machine-learning study of crop yields in Sierra Leone, which asks whether rice harvests can be forecast from the data the country actually has. I founded the RiseAfrica Foundation for STEM and Innovation, a youth-led nonprofit advancing accessible STEM education and leadership development for African youth in under-resourced communities. Through RiseAfrica I've facilitated AI literacy workshops in Sierra Leone, now free and self-paced online, because African data scientists should train on African data to solve African problems. I write as well as research. I founded Everyday Data Science, a practitioner publication where I work through real problems in public, including the ones that don't go to plan, and I'm the author of Understanding Agentic AI. I hold an MSc in Data Science from Pace University and contribute to applied public-sector data science through the National Student Data Corps, working on transportation safety and healthcare analytics.