Many of us were already using our phones for the majority of our waking hours, but during the current shelter-in-place-measures, digital technology has become more important than ever.
When I was in college I took an introductory programming class and promptly forgot 95% of what I learned. Most of the topics of the homework or coding challenges involved in the class were on topics unrelated to my primary area of interest (language data) and the skills did not seem transferable. My research would never rely on animating a face, so how was it useful?
A project that uses many tools that are taught at the D-Lab, and on which I’m excited to be working with students, focuses on exploring the city of Oakland, CA through spatial data.
Why do I find this interesting?
One project that I’ve been working on with a student (CS major, ERG minor) is the exploration of environmental justice and transportation in the City of Oakland, CA.
About three years ago—and six months after I became a PhD candidate—I learned that I was going to become a father. The baby shock was not part of my well-crafted plan for writing my dissertation, and I needed to deal with it. As soon as I heard the news, I emailed my funding agency and rescheduled my fieldwork in Canada. I finished most of my archival work for the dissertation research within that semester. I then wrote a chapter, based on the data I had collected, while waiting for the baby to arrive.
The program is designed to give outstanding UC Berkeley graduate students the opportunity to advance their training within the D-Lab’s diverse and intellectually vibrant community. We offer participants a supportive mentorship and peer-learning environment in which they can apply their expertise and knowledge, gain professional teaching and leadership skills and connect with industry and public sector partners.
Research is the biggest driving force behind innovation and success. It is also the main reason why many of us are drawn to higher education. It is the bread and butter of what we do and why we do it. It is the motivation behind all those underpaid hours we spend in front of our computers designing surveys, crunching numbers, reviewing the literature, making grant deadlines, tediously crafting and re-crafting study protocols, running experiments, going through zillions of revisions on our manuscripts…
The UC Berkeley D-Lab (Social Sciences Data Laboratory) is hiring up to five full-fee remission, 50% time appointment (20 hours/week), graduate student researcher (GSR) positions starting in January 2020 to teach workshops and provide consulting. These positions may be renewed.
In a previous blog I wrote about an exciting project on transportation in cities that, along with some colleagues, I’ve had the opportunity to work on.
Former D-Lab instructor and consultant Chris Hench, now a research scientist in Alexa AI’s Applied Modeling and Data Science group at Amazon, has been collaborating on a project that made it possible for Amazon’s Alexa to feature three new languages: Hindi, U.S. Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese.
Those who are new to data science are recommended by data science blogs and data scientists to pursue side projects. These side projects should showcase your skill set and help you create a foundation for your portfolio. The job industry places a large emphasis on ones “research portfolio” as an important piece of landing a job. Despite this sound logic, I pursue side projects for different reasons..
