From Artist to Data Scientist at Samsung

Changing careers can be very intimidating, and there are few people who have the guts to take a big leap of faith and venture into a new industry. When our students jump from arts or humanities backgrounds into data science, they have several concerns. But if you're interested in mathematics, as well as good at coding and learning quantitative methodologies, a bootcamp is a great way to prepare yourself to be a data scientist.

Alumnus Dean Goldman was an artist by education. He spent four years of college pursuing a Bachelor's in Painting at Rhode Island School of Design, a world-renowned art and design institution. After graduating from college, he worked as a freelance designer. However, he found himself unsatisfied by work, instead becoming interested in pursuing a career in data science.

Dean was always interested in programming and kept honing his quantitative and coding skills. On the side, he also took courses in Python and R. Once he decided to jump-start his career in data science, he began working on a variety of personal data science projects, using data sets from NYC Open Data, as well as the NASA API. These projects involved parsing data using Pandas and Numpy, and visualizing data using Plot.ly, Dash, Seaborn, and Matplotlib. So before he enrolled in the immersive data science bootcamp at NYC Data Science Academy, he was sure about what he wanted from the program. Watch this video to learn more about Dean's transition from artist to data scientist.

Before starting the bootcamp, Dean hoped to broaden his programming skills and get a foundational understanding of what it takes to be a data engineer. Because he came from a design background, he didn't have a foundation in mathematics, statistics, and programming like many other students did. Attending the bootcamp helped him learn modern data analytics techniques and master the requisite skills such as Python, R, and Hadoop - to address real-world data science problems.

This 25 year-old data engineer was hired by Samsung Ads at the "Data Scientist and Employer Networking Event" last year. The hiring events hosted by NYC Data Science Academy played an important role in his job search. As Dean explains, "The job search at NYCDSA is very rigorous. They push you really hard to build your portfolio and to make yourself very marketable for potential employers. The staff is really helpful and help you build a roadmap for getting hired." Dean now works on data insights for Samsung products.

The NYC Data Science Academy hosts the Data Scientist & Hiring Partner Event every quarter. The focus of this networking event is to provide an informal environment for employers to meet our students and learn more about their skills and backgrounds. These events are open to our alumni and bootcamp students. In the past, representatives from Google, IBM, Societe Generale, Conde Nast, MindShare, HelloFresh, VICE Media, The New York Times, Samsung Ads, Adobe, Citadel, Amex, Northwestern Mutual, Chase, AIG, BlackRock, Viacom Media, JP Morgan, UBS, Nielsen, Johnson & Johnson, Unilever, American Express, and many more have attended the event. Most of our students get interviewed at these events and eventually get a data science job. Learn more about hiring events.

Dean's advice to future data scientists is to be ready to learn a lot, hustle, and apply your skills for problem solving, coding, and data analytics. He states that the bootcamp helped him broaden his horizon and helped him get a foundation in the field of data science.

Do you want to change to a career in Data Science like Dean Goldman did? Check out our Immersive Data Science bootcamp, Remote Part-Time Bootcamp and Remote Intensive Bootcamp. To read our student reviews and alumni testimonials, check out NYCDSA's profile on SwitchUp.

This post was sponsored by NYC Data Science Academy.