This week, I took a break from my final product and focused more on something else: my future. I will be attending UC Berkeley next year in the Management, Entrepreneurship, and Technology (MET) program! At Berkeley, I will be studying Industrial Engineering and Operations Research (IEOR) + Business to pursue my dreams of creating my own company someday to benefit social good using technology. Although I am no longer pursuing data science directly, I started to think about how IEOR and data science may connect. Industrial Engineering is about a multitude of things; it can be applied to production lines, business operations, or technological advancement – such as data science and machine learning. The main idea of IEOR is simply making systems more efficient using technology and innovation. As I continue in my ISM journey, I have stopped to think about what I want to get out of this experience, considering the new circumstances with no mentor and complete self-learning. I have decided to focus on what would be valuable to my future rather than simply going through the motions of the final product. I want to continue submerging myself in programming and code, because I am certain I will be doing a lot of that in the future! I also want to continue learning more about machine learning, because that is a skill that would be very helpful to learn right now – and one of my bigger interests. I am excited to continue in this program with a new mindset and see where it takes me.

This week, I mostly focused on learning more about how to use TensorFlow, since it is still fairly new to me. I worked on my final product by learning how to code in Python, which is very similar to TensorFlow in some ways. I mainly focused on learning how to use variables and loops, but also importing images and other software - this helped me practice how to import datasets into TensorFlow without downloading too many onto my laptop. I also continued watching video tutorials and following along to keep practicing building machine learning models in TensorFlow. With coronavirus going on, I know many people are working from home now and taking care of their families on top of the work, so it is hard for people to manage everything right now. I have been communicating with my mentor, Mr. Elliott Mitchell, and we have agreed to not continue with the mentorship for the time being. I completely understood, as it is very hard for people to balance everything going on right now, and I think it is best for everyone to focus on taking care of their families. I am glad everyone is staying safe and still learning new things everyday. I am still looking forward to the rest of the year, regardless of any plans that change! 

This past week was our first official week of online school, but luckily for ISM, we do all our work online! The first thing I worked on was my Product Progress Assessment, which was really helpful because I was able to get organized. I was able to reflect on what I’ve accomplished so far, but also to see how much I need to accomplish in the next month. The assessment made me realize that I have done a lot of research, but I need to start developing my model hands-on, so I can finish by the due date. I also worked on my machine learning knowledge by experimenting more, watching Youtube videos, and reading more Kaggle toolkits. This past week was a very reflective week, as I am not sure if we will have a Final Presentation Night, and we are no longer able to have mentor visits. Even though it is hard to think that we may not go back to school, I am so glad that we had ISM to push us towards our career goals this year. The experience itself has taught me so much and it has actually been pretty easy to continue motivating myself to complete my ISM experience. I am excited to continue improvising and modifying my experience and learning more!

This week was a bit different because I was traveling for most of the week! One night, I had some down time, so I decided to start looking into different Kaggle sets that I could use for my final product. I have looked in the past, but this time I wanted to find one that had a guide along with it so I could learn from other people who have worked with that particular dataset. So I spent some time looking at Kaggle datasets and trying to distinguish them from each other. I decided I want to do something either with autonomous driving or with Natural Language Processing, also known as NLP. I found this dataset that deals with autonomous driving and looked at the toolkit that comes with it. It seemed a bit complicated but after I read through most of the resources, I decided that this project would be really cool to work with because it deals with autonomous driving and the future of cars, which I am really interested in. I am also continuing to learn how to use TensorFlow, and built my very first machine learning model with the MNIST dataset! It was really exciting and I am looking forward to exploring more.

This week, we had our original work speeches, so I had many different things to prepare. Early in the week, I mostly worked on my presentation, as I wanted to tweak a few things. I took out a few research assessments and switched around a few of my interviews as well to focus on the research that had the most impact on my work. I also added more information about my original work, and I wanted to make my app into a video so I can play it while I am presenting. I came up with the idea to cut my video into clips of each page and use a gif-maker to convert them into gifs. This way, it acts as a picture file but can play like a video as I present. I also added more information such as the benefits of my original work to the world and my takeaways from ISM so far. I also reflected on my interview with Elliott Mitchell, my mentor, and communicated with him to work out a mentorship. I am still in the process of organizing the details, but for now, we are going to proceed with case studies so I can learn from him on how to manage data-driven projects. I am excited to work with him in the future!

This week was a more relaxed week because I was very focused on my final product. I wanted to keep trying to work on downloading the correct software, so I spent more time watching walkthroughs on YouTube and following them. I ended up downloading a different software to run TensorFlow on, which is called Miniconda. I worked with that for a while, just fixing bugs and trying to get it to work. I also watched some tutorials on how to build “your very first model!” to prepare myself and learn while I am figuring out how to get to that step. After downloading Miniconda, it actually worked pretty well, so I decided I would follow a tutorial to build my first machine learning model. I learned that I needed to download another file, called MNIST, which is a file with images of handwritten numbers that are classified with the corresponding number. I practiced with a tutorial to build a model that classifies the images to the correct number and learned how to classify new images to new numbers. This was really exciting to me because I actually got to build my own machine learning model that functioned properly! It is definitely a learning process but there are so many great resources out there, so I am interested to see where I go next with this project.

This past week was very eventful because I had 2 meetings with professionals. My first meeting was with Mr. Elliott Mitchell, my mentor at Keurig Dr Pepper. I wanted to learn more about Kaggle and make a plan for my final product, so I asked my mentor, Mr. Elliott Mitchell, if we can discuss my project during my mentor visit. We talked about how we are going to move forward with the mentorship and he said he was happy to help with guidance for my project. We talked about how Kaggle is a great tool and looked at a few datasets I could work with. It was so helpful to hear guidance from him and I’m looking forward to learning more from him. We are going to meet every 2 weeks, which I am very excited about. I also had an interview with Ms. Tori Salido, who is a machine learning engineer at Toyota Connected. I was so interested to talk to her because of how innovative Toyota Connected is, and she was so helpful in my research and helped me gain a deeper understanding of machine learning models. We looked into this software called TensorFlow, and she showed me different models I could build for my project using the Kaggle data as a base. We also talked about how I can present the models and result in a business pitch, which she agreed is very important in a tech field. Over the weekend, I worked quite a bit on my final product, such as looking through Kaggle and setting up TensorFlow on my computer through trial and error.

This past week, I was really excited because I had my first mentor visit! It was a little complicated, because it was arranged by Mr. Peter Laube, my “long-distance mentor” in Chicago, who works for State Farm. I really appreciated him taking the extra effort to contact someone at the Plano office, Mr. Zach Stallbohm, who is a data scientist as well. I went to the office and met him, and we ended up going to Starbucks for a while and just chatting about his projects. It was so cool to learn about three projects he is currently working on. After a while, his boss gave me a pass to come into the office, so I was able to go inside and sit with him while he showed me his work. It was so cool to see both the office and his projects! He explained that the aspect of data science that really captivated him is text classification, because he enjoys sifting through the words and pulling out emotion from the words. I thought it was so interesting, especially since he showed me a project he is working on and explained how it corresponds to the code. I also met his friend, Cody, who explained that he really enjoys image-processing. I thought it was so interesting how even though data science is already such a specified field, they still have more specialties within the subject. I really enjoyed learning from Mr. Stallbohm and I hope to visit again in the future. I also set up an interview with Ms. Tori Salido, a machine learning engineer from Toyota Connected, which I am very excited for!

After a long past week, I was happy to have a more relaxed week in ISM. This week, I mostly worked out the details for my ISM mentor, as it was difficult to manage having a long distance mentor, Mr. Peter Laube, and a part-time mentor, Mr. Elliott Mitchell. I am very excited to work with both of them, but I also really want to go into an office and have hands-on experience in a business environment. I reevaluated what area of data science I wanted to focus on and decided I really enjoyed the machine learning aspect, and I wanted to work with the autonomy of cars. I am in the process of reaching out to a few machine learning engineers at Toyota Connected, where I began my ISM interview journey with Mr. Dingchao Zhang. I am very excited to learn more about Toyota Connected, because it seems like the perfect place to get hands-on experience in data science and machine learning. It is a little more startup culture than a larger company, and I am allowed in the office with pretty minor security. It seems like a place where I could really form connections with the people working there and I can’t wait to meet more of them. I am excited to continue with my current mentors and see what Toyota Connected has to offer.

This week, we had our original work speeches, so I had many different things to prepare. Early in the week, I mostly worked on my presentation, as I wanted to tweak a few things. I took out a few research assessments and switched around a few of my interviews as well to focus on the research that had the most impact on my work. I also added more information about my original work, and I wanted to make my app into a video so I can play it while I am presenting. I came up with the idea to cut my video into clips of each page and use a gif-maker to convert them into gifs. This way, it acts as a picture file but can play like a video as I present. I also added more information such as the benefits of my original work to the world and my takeaways from ISM so far. I also reflected on my interview with Elliott Mitchell, my mentor, and communicated with him to work out a mentorship. I am still in the process of organizing the details, but for now, we are going to proceed with case studies so I can learn from him on how to manage data-driven projects. I am excited to work with him in the future!

This week, I was focused on my final product and figuring out what I need to do to complete it. I wasn’t too sure what to do yet, so I brainstormed new ideas, such as working with artificial intelligence or continuing my Smart Cart app from my original work. I met with my long-distance mentor, Mr. Peter Laube, for my first mentoring call. Peter is a Manager of Enterprise Data and Analytics, so he works closely with both data scientists and business teams. We talked about data science in general, and then moved into brainstorming for my final product. He first started by telling me how State Farm began to bring in data scientists, as he was actually the first person in the data science department in State Farm. I really enjoyed hearing about how the data science department at State Farm has grown and where it is headed in the future. Afterwards, we discussed a few ideas for my final product, and agreed that it would be really interesting to continue my original work and develop it into a complete application. He also gave me a few great ideas about modeling, because I want to gain experience in that sector of data science as well. I really appreciated all his help and I am excited to learn more from him!

This past Wednesday, I was so excited to be a part of the ISM Research Showcase. I remember going to this event when my sister, Alyssa, was in ISM three years ago, and I was so impressed with everyone. It was such an amazing experience this year and I really enjoyed talking to everyone about my project. The most valuable part of the night was talking to the parents, students, and mentors about data science, as well as their jobs too. I met so many data scientists – which was unexpected! I met a couple parents that were data scientists, with one in particular working with companies like AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon. It was so interesting to talk to him, as he told me about how he uses data science for marketing to help these companies. He also asked me about my career path, and we were able to talk for several minutes on the different applications of data science. I also really enjoyed talking to the younger students interested in data science, especially these two younger sophomore girls that stopped by. We talked about my project, my interest in data science, and if she should pursue it. It was so much fun passing on my “wisdom” to someone looking into the field, and I hope she explores data science more next year! The research showcase was such an amazing experience, and I am so grateful to have learned so much. I was able to speak to so many data scientists and aspiring STEM students, and present my work to many individuals who have impacted me so much – my parents, my teachers, my friends. I am so thankful to have such an amazing experience with the research showcase and ISM and I can’t wait for the Final Presentation night!

This week I was prepping for the research showcase! Even though I finished my board, I knew there was still a few more things to do. First, I downloaded the final prototype on an iPad so I can present it in front of my board. I wanted to do this because it can go alongside my app pitch papers in my binder so people can get a real sense of how it would work. I also worked with my mentors to work out a schedule. Mr. Peter Laube is located in Chicago right now, so I turned to Mr. Elliot Mitchell, a Director of Data Science at Keurig Dr. Pepper. I had an interview with him on Monday, which was really exciting because I got to hear a lot of interesting things about the company, as well as see their office. They had a lab with a window to the hallway, where I could see scientists working on their next creation – it was so cool! He was really passionate about data scientist and explained numerous topics to me in a very comprehensible way. After the interview, I emailed him and asked him to be my mentor! It seems to be working out as of right now, but he is still checking on the logistics, so I am hoping everything works out and I can put him on my poster board. I am excited for the Research Showcase next Wednesday and to begin mentoring under talented professionals.

Happy Holidays and Happy 2020! This week, I worked on my poster board for the research showcase! I changed it a bit from my original design, as I included a QR code of my digital portfolio and more information on my original work. I am also excited because I asked Mr. Peter Laube to be my mentor and he said yes! This was the week before winter break began, so I am looking forward to beginning my mentorship with him this following semester. He is a Manager of Enterprise Data and Analytics at State Farm, which differs slightly from data science, however, he was very knowledgeable in our interview and I am confident that I can learn a lot of new things from him. I also arranged an interview with Mr. Elliot Mitchell, a Director of Data Science at Keurig Dr. Pepper, because I wanted to gain more insight into the different fields data science can be applied to. I am really interested in how it is used to improve the company as a whole, so I am excited to speak with him more about it! In the next week, I will be tweaking any last details on my poster and preparing for the research showcase. I am looking forward to sharing my work, as well as beginning a new semester of ISM!

This week, I was focused completely on my original work, as I wanted to make sure it was as best as it could be. I needed to create the rest of my app pages, so I worked for a long time creating those and then just perfecting the other pages and drawing the wireframe so it can prototype. I also began working on the paper that goes along with each page, which helps my audience understand what each page does and how data science is interspersed into the app. I was excited to see I had mostly everything finished, but I was still putting finishing touches on a couple different aspects, and typed my original work set-up and summary paper to reflect on my work. I also finished typing the last couple pages for my corresponding paper to my app. This was really nice because I was able to see the work I had done, but also allow myself to think about what can be improved if I were to do it over again. It was so cool to finally see so much research finally come together to make a product, and I am excited to do my final product so I can use my skills to make something beneficial to the field of data science. I’m going to try to make a product that is related to my mentor’s job, so I don’t think I will be continuing the Smart Cart, but I am glad that I had the experience. I also looked a bit on Linkedin and continued to contemplate who I will ask my mentor to be, and I think I have reached a decision!

This week was another busy one, as I had two more interviews – one with Mr. Dan Holman and one with Mr. Brett Beattie. Mr. Holman was so interesting to interview, as he was another Manager of Data Science at State Farm. My favorite part about my interview with him was hearing about his participation in Hackathon and how he used data science in his project. He described how his team created a geospatial map for natural disaster areas, so they coded a machine to look at overhead pictures of houses and buildings to see what level of damage they had and how to fix it. I thought it was so interesting to hear about his day-to-day tasks as well, because he works with people a lot since he is a manager. His advice to me was to learn as much as possible and then understand how to apply it, which I thought was really interesting. My second interview was with Mr. Brett Beattie, a data scientist at Match.com. I thought it was so interesting to hear how data is implemented there! He works in the “searching and matching” area, which means he implements algorithms to match people with similarities in the app. Both of my interviews this week were really interesting and I am so glad I was able to meet with both of them. I also worked more on my original work by designing more of my app. I also researched more on the JSON files, which I found to be so interesting! I need to code them in Python, which will be fun but challenging because I am not too advanced in Python yet. I am watching some videos to start learning about how to code JSON files in Python, and I also found a random output generator that Mr. Dan Holman suggested to me during my interview with him. It seems really cool and I may try to implement it!

These past two weeks were very eventful for me! I had two interviews: one with Mr. Mike Bernico from Google and one with Mr. Peter Laube from State Farm. My interview with Mr. Bernico was so interesting, as we were both very interested in machine bias. He gave plenty of examples, such as how he built a machine to detect smokers in order to predict life insurance policies – this was back when he worked at State Farm. Now, he is a Machine Learning Cloud Consultant at Google, which was super cool, because we talked all about how data is pretty much in every aspect of Google. My interview with Peter Laube was extremely interesting as well, as we discussed in-depth about the skills needed as a data scientist and how he manages his team, as he is a Manager of Data Scientist at State Farm. Both of my interviews were so insightful and I plan to keep in touch with both professionals. I also worked on my original work later during Thanksgiving break. I downloaded Sketch onto my computer and started designing! It was super tricky at first because I didn’t really know how to use the features yet, but I got the hang of it eventually and designed the home page of my app. I also watched two (hour-long) Youtube videos while I designed to understand how I should go about designing and implementing my data into it. I also continued sketching out my ideas for the features and researched what else should go into the app. It was so cool to dive deeper into my interviews and original work, because I feel like I have learned so much just in the past few weeks.

This week, I was super excited because I had a State Farm Data Science Meet-Up I was invited to by Ms. Gigi Coburn, a Senior Data Scientist. Before the event, I made sure to prepare a lot, as I knew I would be meeting many different people and I wanted to make sure I was engaged in networking. I felt so lucky to attend, as I met so many amazing people, most memorably: Mr. Dan Holman, a Director of Data Science; Mr. Peter Laube, a Manager of Data Analytics; and Ms. Gigi Coburn, a Senior Data Scientist. It felt really natural to talk to all three of them and I am planning on interviewing them to further my studies, which they all eagerly agreed to. I also met Mike Bernico, a Machine Learning Cloud Consultant at Google, which was amazing! I am going to interview him as well. Overall, this event was really incredible to attend, and I cannot thank Ms. Coburn enough for inviting me. Even though it was out of my comfort zone, I know that this event has helped me personally improve my communication skills and pushed me to go a few steps further into my research. I can’t wait to continue networking in my future, and I will definitely be looking out for the next data science event!

This week, I began preparing for my research presentation. After looking at different platforms, I decided that Canva was best for designing my theme. I included my quote and mentors, and I am starting to work on my research assessment and speech that goes along with it. I hope this will allow me to continue improving my communication and public speaking skills. I also continued researching for my original work, learning about SQL and Python in my data science course. Although I have only learned the basics of each, I am excited to continue learning more about both. I also reached out to a professional named Ms. Gigi Coburn, a Senior Data Scientist at State Farm, and she invited me to an event next Thursday for all the data scientist in the area. It was so cool when I looked at the event, as it is huge – over 150 data scientists attending! I am very excited to attend the event and hopefully learn more about all aspects of data science, while connecting with many professionals. This is a great networking opportunity so I plan to make the most of it. I am so amazed at Ms. Coburn’s work, as she has planned such an amazing event and I am looking forward to meeting her.

I had a great interview this week with Ms. Ksenia Luu. She is a data scientist at a company called InVision, which is a product design company much like Sketch, which I mentioned in my last blog. Throughout the interview, I gained a ton of insight into what it means to be a data scientist. Since she works remotely, she is responsible for her own work schedule and projects, so she described to me how being a data scientist has a big emphasis on self-motivation and creativity. This is because often she has to problem solve and work on her own projects. I also learned that her job includes mostly collaboration though, because she is constantly working with both a business team and a software developing team. I found this to be very interesting because that is something I want to do as well. I also received some advice about being a woman in STEM, such as asking certain questions in interviews and being more confident in my own abilities. She also gave me some insight into some more ideas for my original work. After hearing about InVision, I researched more about it later in the week and am considering using it for my original work.

This week, I decided to work more on my original work. Before I can start developing my app add-on, however, I needed to keep researching. I continued moving through my Udemy course. I learned about the different aspects of data science, such as machine learning, business intelligence, and regular business. I also delved into the discussion of what data is past, present, and future, as data science encompasses the whole span, but I am more interested in analyzing data to improve the future of the company, rather than look at past data and make conclusions. One thing that I love to focus on is the intersection between business and technology, and within the field of data science is business intelligence, which is the part of data science that particularly focuses on using data from businesses to make decisions on the future of the company. The course gave me more insight into what I can do with business intelligence in my original work, which I found very interesting. I also researched about how I should build my application/add-on, and came across Sketch, a design software. I researched about it and discovered that they just recently added a new feature that allows you to incorporate data into the project you are working on, making it perfect for my original work.

With my data science course on Udemy and three interviews complete, I took this week to step back and think about what I really want to make of this program. I thought about the people I have interviewed so far and came to a conclusion that I want to interview more people to gain more insight into the field and see different perspectives. I scheduled an interview with Ms. Monisha Elumalai, and am setting up another with Ms. Ksenia Luu. Ms. Elumalai is a Programmer Analyst at Walmart, so I am excited to hear another perspective on the STEM field. After researching about a programmer analyst, I discovered that it sounds like something I would really enjoy. It is a mix between data science, programming, and business, which is what I am looking for in a career. Ms. Luu is a Senior Data Scientist at inVision, a product design company. When I looked at her company, I fell in love. The cross-section between product design and something more technical, such as data science, makes it so interesting to me because while I love analytics, product design and business are something I never want to lose sight of. I also continued my Udemy course to work towards my original work, and I continued to brainstorm how I will complete my project. I remembered a software that my sister used during her internship at Quizlet: Sketch. I plan to use the data feature on sketch, which allows you to design an app and input data for the app to run on. This would allow me to have an app for my idea to run on, without having to actually code the app.

As I continue my research, I have been reaching out to more professionals and developing my original work. I wanted my original work to be applicable to the real world, which is why I came up with the “Smart Cart;” an add-on to a grocery application to track the frequency of past purchases and creates a virtual grocery list based on what items you buy in the past, countering the common issue of forgotten groceries. As I continued developing my idea, I wanted some outside perspective, so I took the opportunity to reach out to Ms. Priyanka Paliwal, the app developer at Walmart that I interviewed last week. I chose to ask her because her work with the Scan & Go feature in the Walmart app is what inspired me to think of other solutions to grocery-related issues. She graciously agreed to video-chat with me and gave me great insight into other features I could include in my project, such as adding birthdays and special occasions. It was so great to get outside input on my advice from someone so qualified, and I was extra grateful that she gave me a few contacts I could interview. I also began my data science course on Udemy, which helped me understand the basics of data science, such as the difference between quantitative and qualitative analytics. 

Throughout this last week, I met an array of accomplished individuals and became inspired to begin my journey to create something of my own. We attended the business symposium, where I met a woman working in communications at the City of Frisco and another woman working at a large company in the computer science sector. It was so enlightening to hear from both of their diverse perspectives. I also met Nickquolette Barrett, a successful, self-employed career coach. She was so inspiring to me because of her passion, and she gave me pointers on my resume which I have now implemented. I also began my original work project with my proposal. After researching more about data science, I realized I wanted to find a small problem in daily life and counteract it with data science and technology. Forgetting grocery items, such as something as small as milk, is a common problem among people from ages 16 all the way to retirement age, and this is a problem that could easily be solved with technology. I want to create a database and algorithm that tracks the frequency (bi-weekly, weekly, monthly, etc.) that someone buys certain items and add it to a "grocery schedule" that notifies you of certain groceries that are on your list for that time. I hope to further develop my interest and skills in data science as I pursue this new idea.

This past week led me to explore a different aspect of technology. I interviewed Mrs. Priyanka Paliwal, a Lead iOS App Developer at Walmart. App development is closely related to data science, so I was eager to learn more about the surrounding fields of data science. Mrs. Paliwal provided excellent insight into app development and the overall STEM field. We discussed how computer science is very interesting because of the freedom it holds, and told me that her favorite thing about app development is that she is able to be creative with her ideas. This extremely resonated with me because she was so passionate about her ideas and was able to express them through her job. We discussed coding languages that are prominent in her field, and she showed me the projects she is working on and the data behind it. She also gave me insight into her journey to becoming successful in the STEM field and a few obstacles she has faced being a woman in STEM. Mrs. Paliwal gave me the advice to always speak up and express my opinions, because more often than not, it is something no one else has thought of. It was so inspiring to hear about her journey, and it motivates me to continue on my path exploring data science.

My meeting with Mr. Dingchao Zhang inspires me to continue exploring data science. Throughout the week, I utilized Linkedin to connect with more professionals. I am in contact with a few and hope to set up interviews with a few of them. This Sunday, I had an interview with Mr. Zhen Zhu, a data scientist formerly at American Airlines and now working at OneWorld. He spoke very highly of data science and the impact it has on the world; this is the thing that draws me most to data science. We discussed everything ranging from projects he has worked on, such as using data to determine airfare, to the benefits of certain majors in college, such as Computer Science or Industrial Engineering, to methods to keep data clean. It was so interesting to hear about his experiences and it helped me further my research and understanding. I am looking forward to my next interview on Tuesday with Mrs. Priyanka Paliwal. This will be a unique interview, as she is a Lead App Developer at Walmart, which is very different from the data scientists I interviewed in the past. I am excited to broaden my knowledge as I continue learning about data science, as well as technology and business as a whole. 

As I continue through my ISM journey, I continue to dive deeper into the field of Data Science – learning what it takes and how it works. Through my research assessment this week, I learned about the Rule of Law and how data science has both benefits and deficits when it comes to making decisions in place on humans. On one hand, it can take a more objective approach to decisions, however, humans often need to take factors into account, such as conditions and background of the situation, that machines are not equipped to deal with just yet. This was incredibly interesting to me because it was at the cross-section of machine learning, artificial intelligence, and data science – all things that capture my interest. While connecting with multiple professionals on Linkedin, I am excited to say I have scheduled two more interviews with highly-skilled professionals: Mr. Dingchao Zhang, a Senior Data Scientist at Toyota Connected and Mrs. Priyanka Paliwal, the Lead App Developer at Walmart. My meeting with Mr. Zhang was very enlightening, as he discussed with me ideas ranging from his latest project to skills of a data scientist to college majors that would lead me to the best jobs in data science. He described how they are working on non-airbag deployment and micro-collision detection in Toyota cars. The passion he had when talking about his work was inspiring, and I am impressed by his skills and leadership. I am excited to interview Mrs. Paliwal as well, and continue reaching out to professionals and learning about data science.

With anticipation and excitement for Senior year, I began my ISM journey with an optimistic outlook, immediately diving deep into my newfound realization of my passion for data science. Through my seven week summer program with GirlsWhoCode, I discovered my interest in data science and gained knowledge surrounding the field. I hope to gain deeper insight into data science as I continue through ISM. With my first Research Assessment, I gained new insight about the data used in leading companies in the United States, and continue to answer my big question: “How is data beneficial to each aspect of a company?” I have also begun reaching out to a few professionals through Linkedin to learn more about what they do. I have officially scheduled my first interview with a Senior Data Scientist at American Airlines, Zhen Zhu, that will occur in two weeks and I am excited to continue reaching out to more people that I can learn from. Despite the fact that the year has just begun, I am already fascinated with the opportunities that ISM has guided me towards and I cannot wait to continue my research on data science through conducting interviews, reading articles, and eventually finding a mentor for a more hands-on experience. In the next week, I hope to seek out two more professionals to interview and continue discovering new intricacies in the field of data science.