Student Spotlight | Winston Lee, Data Analytics

Meet Winston, a Finance graduate who is currently enrolled in BrainStation’s Data Analytics Certificate Course. Exercising his entrepreneurial spirit while also running a family business, Winston is constantly looking for ways to develop professionally. We asked Winston how he plans to use his new skills in data to elevate his career.

BrainStation: What is your education or career background?

Winston: I have degrees in Finance and Interdisciplinary studies that focused on art, social science, and economics. I previously worked in accounting at a firm that focused on helping distressed businesses, but now I am currently focusing on my family business and passion for the arts.

How did you first hear about BrainStation?

I learned about BrainStation through a friend who was a Data Analyst for Google in Hong Kong before moving to Vancouver for a better work-life balance. We discussed his line of work and it sparked my curiosity.

Which course are you currently enrolled in?

I’m enrolled in BrainStation’s part-time Data Analytics Certificate Course. I first heard the term “big data” back in 2013 during a TED talk conference. I could see the importance of big data, and pursuing the path of a data analyst was not something I dove into immediately, but now I can see a long-term career path, and it starts with BrainStation.

What sparked your decision to register for the course?

The biggest push for my decision was my family business. We deal with a very particular raw material called Zirconium dioxide (aka Zirconia), it’s a ceramic powder being mined out in west Australia that we process and experiment with.

We have formed relationships with the Taiwanese International Technology and Research Institute to do R&D for various applications of Zirconia. The predominant use for Zirconia is teeth enamels in stomatology. Most of us who hear about Zirconium dioxide would think of either cubic zirconium (synthetic diamonds) or Zirconium watches like the apple watch. There are actually many applications of Zirconia, for example in refrigerators, textile machinery, cellphone encasement, and in nuclear and military weapons.

What I would like to do is to have a deeper understanding of data to eventually become a Data Scientist and help the R&D team come up with new applications for Zirconia.

What aspects of the course are you most excited about?

I am excited to learn how to organize data and utilize various software like SQL and Tableau to visualize data in a meaningful way. I am most excited about SQL because it plays into presentation, which is very important in visualizing information for others to understand easily. It allows me to draw meaningful patterns and present complex data findings and problems to the company or the public.

How are you hoping to apply these skills in the future?

Like many others, I believe that data is integrated into every aspect of our lives and therefore by having the skills to collect, clean, organize, contextualize, draw patterns, and present data is very useful in any business. I do hope that my skills will develop beyond data analytics and into the realm of data science to partake in the research and development process of new tech applications of raw materials like Zirconia.

Want to learn more about the course Winston is taking? Check out BrainStation’s Data Analytics Certificate Course.