Cohort 10 Student Spotlight: Meet Ka Yam
Ka is a student in Cohort 10 of the Master of Science in Data Science program at the University of San Francisco. She joined the MSDS program after completing her Bachelor’s degree in Biology at the University of California, San Diego and working in health insurance consulting.
Background
Evie: Hey Ka, can you start by telling us a little bit about your background?
Ka: I studied biology, global health, and business during my undergraduate days at UC San Diego. After that, I spent three years working as an analyst in healthcare and insurance consulting where I got to work with a lot of data and saw a lot of the business impact that we could get from careful manipulation and analysis of data, so here I am, talking to you and studying data science at USF!
Why Data Science?
Evie: Thanks! So what made you want to pursue a career in data science?
Ka: Like I mentioned, I got to work with a lot of datasets in my past work experience and the insights that we were able to generate allowed us to make better, more data-driven, and overall more informed decisions. From there, my hunger to learn more about how to better use data grew, and I just wanted to be more technical and learn more about data science as a subject. In today’s day and age, we are surrounded by data everywhere we go, so I wanted to see how we can use data to better understand the world we live in.
Evie: Do you think your global health perspective from undergrad influences the way you view how we can use data science, and is this something that you would want to explore more?
Ka: Yeah, I think coming from a non-traditional, non-technical background — not having studied math or computer science or anything like that in the past — really allowed me to see things differently. I think it better allows me to try and think from a user’s standpoint and see where they’re coming from, rather than jumping straight into the numbers and seeing what we can pull from them. Health tech is definitely something that interests me and I hope to eventually see how we can use data science to make better products, especially within the realm of women’s health.
Why the USF MSDS Program?
Evie: That’s great! In particular, why did you pick USF’s MSDS program?
Ka: There were a few things about USF’s program that really caught my eye. One of them was USF’s practicum program, so as students begin to learn and practice at our practicum doing different projects, it can really help us solidify the concepts that we are learning in class. The other thing is the diversity in our student body. We have students from all walks of life, like you having studied psychology, me having studied biology and business, and so many other students like us that don’t come from typical data science backgrounds. This program has really been so welcoming in terms of teaching everybody that is interested in the field.
Evie: I agree, I remember feeling the same way when I was looking at programs because like you said, coming from a psychology background myself, I wanted to make sure I would be in an environment that would embrace my background and still allow me to thrive.
Ka: Right, and look at us now! I think coming from a non-technical background gives us a really important and different perspective on the work we’re doing.
Favorite class and project?
Evie: What would you say has been your favorite class and your favorite project so far?
Ka: I know we still have a lot to learn, but I have really been enjoying the Intro to Machine Learning class. It’s definitely very difficult and challenging, but I really like being able to see the math behind the algorithms and built-in libraries out there and be able to implement them and see how they tie together. It’s hard work — don’t get me wrong — but I think it pushes me to think in ways that I haven’t thought before and that’s really cool to me. In terms of projects, I really like the sentiment project we did in Data Acquisition. Being able to do sentiment analysis on users’ tweets was really interesting because I never knew how much we could gather just from a few words that people type online.
Evie: Do you think Natural Language Processing and that type of analysis is something you would want to incorporate into your work, whether it’s down the line in your career or in your practicum project right now?
Ka: Definitely! I would really want to dive deeper with the time and opportunities that are available to me to learn more about how those libraries and tools work.
Areas you are most interested in?
Evie: What areas of data science are you most interested in?
Ka: While I was studying global health, I got to do a project where we studied people’s behaviors. From this experience, I’m interested in more deeply exploring and understanding user behavior, especially since nowadays, everyone is on their devices so often. I think it would be really cool to use data science to learn more about that area.
Practicum
Evie: I think that leads well into our next question, which is, what is your practicum project?
Ka: I am lucky and fortunate to be able to work with Reddit during my practicum. I’ll be working with their ads team, so this ties pretty closely to my interest in user behavior, and our goal in my project is to deliver relevant advertising content to users.
Program Experience in the Pandemic
Evie: How has your experience in the program been, especially with the pandemic?
Ka: It was really hard in the beginning coming from a role where I was working from home for so long, and in general, the transition from working to being a student again is challenging to me. It has been really nice that we are able to come to campus, obviously wearing masks and practicing proper safety measures, and I’ve really enjoyed getting to meet all of my classmates. I think my experience would have been so different if we couldn’t come in person — like, I probably wouldn’t have met you — just because through Zoom, there’s a lot more distance, so I’ve been very grateful that we are able to be together, learn from each other, and support each other through our challenges.
Evie: I agree, I think the support that we are able to give each other by having met and bonded in person is a huge part of my experience in this program.
Personal Interests
Evie: What do you like to do to unwind and how do you spend your free time outside of the program?
Ka: I like to go on hikes and find new food to eat. Honestly, half the time I’m too tired to go on hikes, but that’s what I would like to do. More realistically, I like to watch TV shows, especially reality TV shows which are definitely a guilty pleasure of mine. I like how when I’m watching reality TV, I can just turn my brain off and have a nice break before getting back to work.
