Working with ArcGIS in GEOB 270 helped me rediscover my curiosity and enthusiasm for learning to work with new software, which I haven’t had an opportunity to do since my very first programming course back in first year, and even further back, when I made short films for fun in high school. Through the five labs, I learned how to transform overwhelming data into an accessible visual final product, and the advantages of doing so. I found myself spending many hours beyond the weekly labs trying out different variations to organize and visualize data than was suggested in the labs just for fun, and troubleshooting by researching on my own when things (inevitably) fell apart. I learned that I am very detail-oriented and have a knack for finding creative and efficient ways to do tasks, by combining best practices from the many resources and helpful GIS experts online. If I could do the course again, I wish I could have made the time to think of and pursue an original research question for the final project with my team, as I think selecting a research topic and defining its parameters is a challenge unto itself. From our lessons on ethics, I learned how data can be used to argue so many different perspectives, and construct very specific narratives. It would have been an interesting exercise to examine if/how our own subjective decisions on topic selection influenced the final product.