When applying to the Institute for Advanced Analytics, I was terrified that my degree in Animal Science would not contribute to my success in the program.
I figured I would be behind on anything statistics or computer science related, but I forgot to consider all of the other aspects of Data Science and the IAA.
Since being here, I’ve managed to identify and apply my strengths, work on improving my weaknesses, and have now found myself in a Practicum Team Lead position.
If you come from a different educational background than a typical Data Science individual, I am going to share how you can harness those unique skills that you have gained to ultimately grow and succeed throughout this program.
You may be wondering, what skills from Animal Science have I been able to apply at the Institute for Advanced Analytics? I can confidently say that knowing things such as how to trim a sheep’s hooves definitely didn’t transfer over to the IAA, but many soft skills have.
Soft skills such as communication, leadership, adaptability, problem-solving are vital skills that play an immensely relevant role at the Institute.
For instance, the ability to work on a team collaboratively and successfully was something that I did on many occasions throughout undergrad. Often, I would have to work with other students to complete tasks, whether animal related or not, and get to a desired end goal. It was important to delegate tasks, do your part, ask for help when necessary, and support the team relationship and goals. I’ve been able to bring in my experience with this skill and apply it to new situations. There are so many team-based assignments throughout this program where I’ve truly been able to utilize this skill and teach others how to improve it for themselves as well. The ability to identify which soft skills you have coming into the program may be the most difficult part, but actually using them within this program will come naturally, and your classmates and faculty will easily see this skill as one of your strengths.
Don’t get me wrong, I was still extremely worried about being unprepared for the program in different areas. Coding never came easily to me. I just began coding in my last year of undergrad to prepare before beginning at the Institute; meanwhile, some of my other classmates have been coding for years in different languages. When discovering your weaknesses, the most important thing is perseverance. You can’t stop trying just because you know something is a weakness of yours.
The ability to persevere through difficult tasks and put in the extra effort to grow that skill is so important as a student and for whatever career you pursue later in life.
In terms of my weakness, I decided to challenge myself. I began looking for any and all opportunities to strengthen my coding skills.
To name a few ways I did this:
- began studying for the Certified Entry-Level Python Programmer certification
- took DataCamp lessons online
- began my own side-project
- organized all the code that was given throughout our statistics classes.
It’s important for me to point out that all of these opportunities were things that I did outside of the classroom. The IAA was not making me do any of these things, but I wanted to grow and improve my coding skills. I’m still not an expert programmer YET, but what’s important is that I’m taking the steps necessary to take this skill from a weakness, to something I’m comfortable with, to (hopefully) a strength later on.
The more effort and dedication you put into this program, the more you will get out of it in terms of knowledge and experience. It is not enough to just have experience in computer science or statistics. Instead, it is a combination of collaboration, communication, commitment inside and outside of the classroom, other soft skills, and technical skills that will make you a great student. It is important when coming in with a different background to know what soft or technical skills you have obtained in your past experience, but also how to utilize them throughout the program to truly allow for growth and success.
Columnist: Gosnell Madison