This week, we were all asked to reflect upon our data collection skills- where we felt we had gained those skills, areas that still need work, and how it has previously been approached in our formal education. I believe that we all felt a real sense of familiarity with straight forward data collection and analysis. Our studies have prepared us well to be able to interpret numbers in a pretty cut and dry sense. However, there was also some shared sentiment that when it came to the nuances of how to pair data with other data sets in order to clearly express some message, or analyze with the level of depth desired, we sometimes felt somewhat lacking. However, this process has greatly expanded upon our skills and allowed for a lot of growth.
Another sentiment that we shared this week when thinking about how we communicate data was that it is not always a skill gained in our science classes when surrounded by peers who share the same thorough background knowledge as us. Our strongest communication tools are things learned in jobs in the service industry or at local pharmacies or even in just trying to share what we study with friends outside of the Faculty of Science. While I do not believe that any of us could claim mastery in terms of our communication, it is in our daily lives outside of the classroom that we have felt our communication skills flourish. By being forced to communicate with people who have a different knowledge base, we are also forced to become better communicators, ensuring that what we are trying to share can be easily understood by any possible audience.