data-science-notes/intro.md

Introduction to Data Science

Lesson Objectives

1. Intros
2. What is Data Science?

Intros

1. Here's a bit about me
2. This class can be about networking, too! Tell us about yourself!
   • What is Your Name?
   • What Brings You To GA?
   • What Are Your Current Activities?

What is Data Science?

What is it, exactly?

• A set of tools and techniques used to extract useful information from data.
• An interdisciplinary, problem-solving oriented subject

What does it consist of?

• Programming skills
• Math and Statistics knowledge
• Business sense
• Domain Knowledge
• Communication Skills

Your Turn: Qualities Of A Data Scientist And You

Let's talk through the following questions in groups:

1. What do you think are the most important qualities for a data scientist?
2. Can you think of any other quality/skill we have not mentioned?
3. What is your field of expertise?
4. Do you use tools such as Excel, Stata, R, or Python?
5. Where are you in the intersection of these skills?

Possible Answers: Qualities Of A Data Scientist And You

• Ask good questions:
  • What is required?
  • How are results evaluated? (measures of success)
  • What do we currently know? (existing data)
  • What has happened? (descriptive analytics)
  • What will happen (if)? (predictive analytics)
  • What to do to achieve what we require? (insight)
• Define and test a hypothesis/run experiments.
• Scrape, & sample business relevant data.
• Manipulate, sanitize, and wrangle data.
• Visualize data.
• Understand data relationships.
• Tell the machine how to learn from data.
• Create data products that deliver actionable insight.
• Tell relevant business stories from data.