Cohort 7 Student Spotlight: Meet Sankeerti
Sankeerti Haniyur joined the MSDS program with a background in Economics and Statistics. She spent time at LinkedIn as a data analyst and came to the MSDS program to further explore Data Science.
What were you doing before the program?
I graduated in 2017 from UC Davis with a double major in Statistics and Economics. Originally, I thought I wanted to go into finance, but when my statistics classes started getting into Data Science, I wanted to explore it more. I ended up getting a job at LinkedIn as a data analyst. Because it was a contract position for a year, I thought of it like a test run; if I liked it and wanted to pursue it, I’d do a masters degree because I know that it is usually necessary to have a higher education degree in the field of Data Science. It worked out well that my contract at LinkedIn was ending and I ended up joining this program.
What led you from Economics to Data Science?
At UC Davis, I started with only a major in Economics. Because I thought that I wanted a path in finance, and because my Economics degree was very theory-based, I was interested in getting further training in math. I realized I wasn’t doing anything technical — no coding, no math, so I needed to do something to boost my skills in that area. That’s why I chose to add Statistics. I felt it would be a good fit — and it was, but I also realized that Data Science is really cool too. We were using R, python, SQL in my statistics classes and it helped me get an intro to Data Science early on; which I am thankful for.
How would you like to apply Data Science?
I’m still interested in finance, but I realized there are so many things Data Science can be used for. It’s cool that you can use Data Science for everything, but it also makes it hard to make a decision. I rethink my decision a bunch of times. It is difficult, but also good problem to have because you have so much flexibility in choosing what you want to do — even further in your career. During the pitch week I explored the FinTech companies. I think, now a days, hedge funds are doing cool things with Data Science, especially on the quantitative analytics side.
Being from the Bay Area, what are your favorite things to do in San Francisco and what would you suggest for new people to explore?
It depends on what you’re interested in. If you’re interested in more nature/adventure, you can do a few things in the city like the Lands End Trail. It is a walk, not a hike, and you get a really great view by the Golden Gate. That’s an easy walk to do on the weekends. If you want to do something more intense, you can go up north into the Marin Headlands area. It’s super beautiful there. There are also a couple of vista points that you can drive to, if you’re not interested in hiking.
In the city, there are cool things to do like bowling, golf, nice bars on the water front. There are also a lot of different areas within San Francisco where you could spend the whole day and if you were to visit these areas over a long period of time, you will still find new things and not get bored. Personally, I really like the Mission area because of its food and I also love that the city is very vegetarian friendly.
What was your experience in Practicum Pitch week?
I appreciated that we had time to network with the companies. I thought that interaction was really helpful because I felt differently about reading about the companies’ profiles and projects versus seeing their presentation in person. That in itself made a big difference in my preferences. I even changed my preferences again when I met the mentors and talked to the people working at the company. Since we are going to be there for 9 months, it’s really important to take these interactions into consideration. I thought it was great that they made that time available to us.
