Elon University Mathematics & Statistics Department

Senior Celebration Dinner 2019 Keynote Address

Good evening and thank you for having me as a speaker tonight. I am especially excited to be here because I actually did not attend my senior dinner because I studied abroad during my last semester at Elon and wasn’t back in time for this or graduation. So, nine years later, I am happy to be here and experience this with you all.

I graduated from Elon with a major in Mathematics, minor in Statistics and in Business Administration. I was really interested in Statistics, but that was back in the days when a Statistics major didn’t exist so Math is was. We had 13 Math majors in my year, so we fittingly named ourselves the Bakers Dozen. My course of study in math and statistics followed a non-linear path with many ups and downs.

I remember the first time I “hit the wall” was during my linear algebra class junior year. You know what I mean by “hit the wall”, right? I think everyone in a quantitative field eventually reaches this point, where they are sitting in class, or a meeting, and have absolutely no idea what is going on. I remember leaving the final exam for that class thinking, “oh my gosh, I literally just wrote down a bunch of made up stuff,” which later turned into, “what if I’m not cut out for this field?”

This was the first of many walls that I encountered throughout my education in math and statistics. You all have probably experienced something like this, or will in your future. What I have realized is that to be successful in our field, you have to figure out how to emotionally handle when you hit the wall and how to proceed. In my linear algebra class, I earned my first C (although it was a C+), and subsequently decided to pick up a minor in Business Administration as a backup plan.

From there, it unfortunately only got significantly worse before it got better. After Elon, I began graduate school at a large university within a pure statistics program. My experience there could not have been more opposite compared to Elon—huge class sizes, professors who didn’t know my name, and a system structured to fail the bottom of the class at each step of the way. It wasn’t too long before I hit another huge wall, with lots of smaller walls also around it. Despite working as hard as I could, I failed a few exams, barely passed my classes, and was at risk of having my stipend taken away the entire time I was there. At one point, a professor told me, in front of several of my peers, that I would never get my PhD. It felt as if my head had slammed into a brick wall, bounced back, then hit it again and again.

I stood before this wall, and made the impossibly difficult decision to leave the program. I felt like such a failure. So, I took a job in Charleston, South Carolina as a master’s level biostatistician thinking, “the beach will be nice.” And it was. It took a while for me to bounce back from hitting the graduate school wall, but I was determined.

I enrolled in a biostatistics program, where in just 3 and a half years, I graduated with my PhD. One of my proudest achievements was being named one of the top two out of fifty graduates in the College. My experience in graduate school this time was quite different: there were only two people in my class: myself, and the guy who is now my husband. I had mentors and professors who legitimately cared about me and my future career. Graduate school on my second try was a complete 180 compared to my first attempt, and I’m glad I bounced back around to get my PhD.

I gave the Cliff notes version of my journey, but you can probably tell that I’ve had some experience with hitting the wall. And I think it is how we react to these challenges that really make us who we are. Resiliency is an absolute must in our field. This bears repeating, so I will say it again: resiliency is an absolute must in our field. Whether you plan on going to graduate school or taking a job after graduation, you will surely have your share of walls in your future. My advice is: keep your eye on the prize; establish your goals and what really drives you, and don’t let anything stop you, no matter how many times you need to bounce back. No one can tell you what you can or can’t achieve except yourself.

My other advice is to figure out your strengths and hone in on that. As Einstein said, “Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” A mistake I made in my first attempt at graduate school was going to a program focused on statistical theory, which was not my forte. When I later attended a biostatistics program, I was able to leverage my strengths involving communication and practical problem-solving in order to be successful.

Despite the many walls and challenges I faced at Elon and in graduate school, the exciting opportunities in the field of statistics made it worthwhile. As you all are probably aware, statistics is a wonderful field to be in right now. For the fourth year in a row, “data scientist” (also known as the hip term for statistician) is the best job in America according to Forbes. It is no secret that we have high job satisfaction, challenging work and overall good work-life balance. Also the decent pay helps!

As I gained more knowledge about statistics in graduate school and through research, something that drew me to the field was that I could use my quantitative strengths to help people. When I was deciding whether to take a job in industry or academia, a mentor asked me, “Do you want to answer lots of questions or do you want to answer the specific question of how do I make more money?”. I decided that I wanted to answer lots of questions, so I went into academia. That is not to say that industry is wrong or bad, if you don’t mind answering the same question over and over again, then by all means, go make your money!

But for me, I really like that I get to use my skillset to improve medical care. I truly do feel like I am making a difference in the world. Every day I am faced with new challenges and problems to think about, and I enjoy working with interdisciplinary teams in order to help patients. I love the autonomy that my academic career affords me—I get to decide when, where and who I work with, as long as I am publishing and bringing in grant support, my department chair is happy. I love that I have the opportunity to teach and mentor students, travel to conferences, and pursue my own research agenda.

One of my favorite things about being a biostatistician is that I am constantly learning about different fields within medicine. During my time as a master’s level statistician, I served as a statistical programmer for two international clinical trials investigating new treatments for stroke patients. I have also collaborated with hepatologists to develop several prediction models for disease progression of acute liver failure. I have served as a biostatistical collaborator on projects with opthalmologists, emergency room doctors, neurologists, gerontologists, and nephrologists. Several studies involved collaborations with basic scientists to evaluate the potential for using novel biomarkers to evaluate patient prognosis. I even have a patent for an algorithm developed to classify types of mitochondria. My resume is basically equivalent to an everything bagel, and my Jeopardy game has significantly improved with all of the random medical knowledge I have floating around in my brain. I love that my job is intellectually challenging and is constantly making me a better thinker, collaborator and communicator.

Whatever made you want to pursue a career in statistics or mathematics, congrats, you found an ideal field. My journey in statistics has been full of walls and opportunities, but I am so glad that I ended up here. Stay strong when you hit the walls; this will ultimately make you a better person and a better statistician/mathematician/data scientist, or whatever this job is called in the future. I wish you all the best in your journey.