UCLA Extension interviewed Rashed Iqbal, instructor and creator of the Data Science Courses at Extension.
In this excerpt, Iqbal provides advise to those new to the field of Data Science:
“On the last day of my class, I normally tell my students what they learned in the class may already have been obsolete. Data Science no longer is a new field but tools, techniques, programming languages, libraries, and even concepts are evolving very fast. So be ready to continue learning forever. Secondly, if you are switching your field, you will need time and hard work in long terms to become an expert in this field. Remember, you need 10,000 hours to spend in an area before being able to call yourself an expert and Data Science in a multidisciplinary field!
Thirdly, I want to say you can do it. I had a student who attended my Introduction to Data Science course. She was a medical doctor but after attending my class, she decided she wants to become a Data Scientists. After many discussions, she enrolled in Masters in Data Science from UC Berkeley and will be graduating next year. Another student who was an English major with High School mathematics and no programming exposure decided to become a Data Scientist. It took her two years of hard work to accomplish her goal but she is happily employed as a Data Scientist today.”
Read the whole interview here.