Born Again Data Enthusiast

I wanted to start my career in data science with a blog that blew people away. I wanted to explain the most complex statistical concept or machine learning algorithm in a way that a novice or non-technical person would say, “Yes! OMG I understand that, please come work for me and explain more to me!” This…isn’t that type of blog, for now at least. I figured first I should introduce myself and let you know where I am coming from before I get into the good stuff.

Who am I? I am a once non-practicing member of the church of math, a born again statistician of sorts. I have finally decided to start putting the time in to make that passive passion into something I will use and practice for the rest of my career. I received my undergrad degree in Operations Research and Computer Analysis. I loved the courses in my major. My first “individual development plan” for as a Coast Guard officer was littered with my plans to dominate the world of statistics and decision science.

Then, something happened…life. My jobs in the Coast Guard never led me back to math. My jobs gave me very little opportunity to perform any optimization or regression problems. I was sent to grad school, not for a math-related field, but for strategic intelligence.

A few years later, as my Coast Guard career had ended and I was well into my career as a civil servant, I decided to get my MBA. It was through my business statistics, data analytics, and decision science courses that my dormant aspirations awoke. So I did my research, “crunched the numbers,” and placed a bet on myself to change careers. Here I am in the midst of a career change aided by a data science immersive.

My agenda in blogging will be two-fold (three if you count grading for this immersive!). First, I want to show how data science can answer some of the questions we ask ourselves and others on a day-to-day basis. Some of these blogs will use day-to-day situations and the seemingly silly questions we ponder to ourselves but rarely say aloud. For example, my next blog will examine the dangers of unbalanced classes by analyzing the possibility of falling through a grate while walking in downtown Washington, D.C. (Thanks to my cohort member Jessie Owens for the idea).

The second part of the motivation to do this blog is to keep learning. I am a firm believer that you only master a subject matter when you can explain it to someone in simple terms. This blog is a test to see how much I truly know about the subject I love and am continuing to learn.

I hope to connect to an audience that is as eager as I am to view the world through data science lenses. Thank you for taking the time to read. Any suggestions for questions to answer with data science are more than welcome!

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