<center><a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/2850209725308354/"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1620856375/generic_live_event_banner_yxjjkt.png" /></a></center><br>
<p>Have you ever applied to a job that seemed like the perfect fit but never heard back after the application?  </p>
<p>During this webinar, we will discuss best practices to help your application get noticed in today’s competitive data science job market. We will focus on how you can improve your personal brand and help position yourself for success in your job search.  </p>
<h2 id="agenda-">Agenda</h2>
<ol>
<li>Applicant tracking systems</li>
<li>Resume and portfolio tips</li>
<li>Targeted cover letters</li>
<li>LinkedIn for success: profile, job searches, networking, and more!</li>
<li>Q&amp;A</li>
</ol>
<h2 id="speaker">Speaker</h2>
<p>Jen Bricker leads the Career Services team mentoring learners during their job search. Previously, she led the Instructor Success team hiring hundreds of data scientists, working with them to build DataCamp content.  Prior to DataCamp, she worked in non-profit management as well as data analytics adult education. Her career has always centered around her two main passions - people and data!</p>
<h2 id="where-">When</h2>
<p>June 10th at 11:00 AM ET</p>
<h2 id="where-">Where</h2>
<center><a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/2850209725308354/"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1620855480/Blog_Event_Banner_qbb21f.png" /></a></center>
<ul>
<li>Live on our <a href="https://www.facebook.com/events/2850209725308354/">Facebook page</a>. Follow us so you get notified!</li>
<li><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/events/linkedinlive-howtostandoutfromt6798359236817518592/">LinkedIn Live</a></li>
<li><a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC79Gv3mYp6zKiSwYemEik9A">YouTube Live</a></li>
</ul>


https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/how-to-stand-out-from-the-crowd

This webinar is well suited for individuals who want to improve their personal brand while looking for a job in data science.

Live Event: How To Stand Out From the Crowd

<p><center><a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/groups/business"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1612888906/insights_qhc4kg.png" /></a></p>
<h3 id="-building-a-learning-culture-that-drives-the-business-forward-https-www-mckinsey-com-business-functions-mckinsey-accelerate-our-insights-building-a-learning-culture-that-drives-business-forward-mckinsey"><a target="_blank" href="https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/mckinsey-accelerate/our-insights/building-a-learning-culture-that-drives-business-forward">Building a learning culture that drives the business forward</a> | McKinsey</h3>
<p>In this interview, McKinsey’s Chief Learning Officer Matthew Smith, shares his thoughts around delivering learning programs for 30,000+ employees, his best practices on creating a sustainable learning culture, and how people can become better learners.</p>
<h3 id="-ai-adoption-in-the-enterprise-2021-https-www-oreilly-com-radar-ai-adoption-in-the-enterprise-2021-o-reilly"><a target="_blank" href="https://www.oreilly.com/radar/ai-adoption-in-the-enterprise-2021/">AI Adoption in the Enterprise 2021</a> | O’Reilly</h3>
<p>This O&#39;Reilly report covers the state of AI in the enterprise. While the use and deployment of AI in the enterprise has never been more prevalent, organizations still suffer from lack of AI talent, data quality issues, a lack of data culture, and the absence of tooling to scale and monitor AI systems in production .</p>
<p><br><center><a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/groups/business"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1612888907/Editor_s_Picks_nj17hh.png" /></a></p>
<h3 id="-this-has-just-become-a-big-week-for-ai-regulation-https-www-technologyreview-com-2021-04-21-1023254-ftc-eu-ai-regulation-bias-algorithms-civil-rights-mit-technology-review"><a target="_blank" href="https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/04/21/1023254/ftc-eu-ai-regulation-bias-algorithms-civil-rights/">This has just become a big week for AI regulation</a> | MIT Technology Review</h3>
<p>The regulatory space for AI is heating up. Over the past week, the European Union has released its plans for wide-ranging regulations on AI systems, and the Federal Trade Commission released plans to take action on AI systems that exhibit bias and discrimination. Check out this article for a detailed view on both these plans.</p>
<h3 id="-five-types-of-thinking-for-a-high-performing-data-scientist-https-towardsdatascience-com-five-types-of-thinking-for-a-high-performing-data-scientist-8ab70d70c23b-a399-anand-rao"><a target="_blank" href="https://towardsdatascience.com/five-types-of-thinking-for-a-high-performing-data-scientist-8ab70d70c23b#a399">Five types of thinking for a high performing data scientist</a> | Anand Rao</h3>
<p>In this blog post, Anand Rao, Global Artificial Intelligence Lead at PwC articulates mental models for high-performing data scientists. These mental models are highly useful for data scientists to reason about the world and the problems they’re trying to solve.</p>
<p><br><center><a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/groups/business"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1612889346/Inspiration2_wxr25i.png" /></a></p>
<h3 id="-achieving-insights-and-savings-with-cost-data-https-medium-com-airbnb-engineering-achieving-insights-and-savings-with-cost-data-ec9a49fd74bc-airbnb"><a target="_blank" href="https://medium.com/airbnb-engineering/achieving-insights-and-savings-with-cost-data-ec9a49fd74bc">Achieving Insights and Savings with Cost Data</a> | Airbnb</h3>
<p>Any data-driven organization has to scale its cloud infrastructure and make sure it’s doing so efficiently. In this blog post, find out how the team at Airbnb leveraged AWS cost data to reduce spend and achieve AWS cost savings.</p>
<h3 id="-the-right-way-to-measure-roi-on-data-quality-https-www-montecarlodata-com-the-right-way-to-measure-roi-on-data-quality-monte-carlo-data"><a target="_blank" href="https://www.montecarlodata.com/the-right-way-to-measure-roi-on-data-quality/">The Right Way to Measure ROI on Data Quality</a> | Monte Carlo Data</h3>
<p>Data quality issues can have serious consequences on the bottom line of any aspiring data-driven organization. In this article, learn how to calculate the ROI for increasing data quality and to garner executive support for any data governance or quality effort.</p>
<h3 id="-new-ai-tool-calculates-materials-stress-and-strain-based-on-photos-https-news-mit-edu-2021-ai-materials-stress-strain-0422-mit-news"><a target="_blank" href="https://news.mit.edu/2021/ai-materials-stress-strain-0422">New AI tool calculates materials’ stress and strain based on photos</a> | MIT News</h3>
<p>Engineers often spend countless hours solving complex equations to determine the stress and strain on the materials they work with. A new deep-learning-based approach, promises to streamline this process by leveraging image data alone.</p>
<p><br><center><a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/groups/business"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1618166459/Tools_and_Techniques_1_ybwltq.png" /></a></p>
<h3 id="-time-series-forecasting-at-microsoft-https-medium-com-data-science-at-microsoft-time-series-forecasting-part-1-of-3-understanding-the-fundamentals-13b52eda3e5-yasmin-bokobza-siddharth-kumar"><a target="_blank" href="https://medium.com/data-science-at-microsoft/time-series-forecasting-part-1-of-3-understanding-the-fundamentals-13b52eda3e5">Time series forecasting at Microsoft</a> | Yasmin Bokobza &amp; Siddharth Kumar</h3>
<p>This series of articles on the Data Science at Microsoft blog deep dives into the best practices for time series forecasting from choosing the right forecasting method to simplifying the forecasting workflow, and more.</p>
<h3 id="-openai-powered-linux-shell-uses-ai-to-do-what-you-mean-https-riveducha-onfabrica-com-openai-powered-linux-shell-river-s-educational-channel"><a target="_blank" href="https://riveducha.onfabrica.com/openai-powered-linux-shell">OpenAI-powered Linux shell uses AI to Do What You Mean</a> | River’s Educational Channel</h3>
<p>Ever get tired of forgetting bash syntax? This project leverages OpenAI’s GPT-3 to generate bash commands based on a written description. Check out how it performs on commands like “find all files in current directory bigger than 1gb”.</p>
<p><br><center><a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/groups/business"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1612889508/From_DataCamp_c6kasv.png" /></a></p>
<h3 id="-webinar-democratizing-data-in-government-agencies-https-www-datacamp-com-resources-webinars-democratizing-data-in-government-agencies-"><a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/resources/webinars/democratizing-data-in-government-agencies">Webinar: Democratizing Data in Government Agencies</a></h3>
<p>In this webinar, Senior Data Scientist at the New South Wales Government Alex Scriven outlines what data democratization means in a government context, and how to best achieve it.</p>
<h3 id="-blog-storytelling-for-more-impactful-data-science-https-www-datacamp-com-community-blog-storytelling-for-more-impactful-data-science-"><a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/storytelling-for-more-impactful-data-science">Blog: Storytelling for More Impactful Data Science</a></h3>
<p>In this blog post, we outline storytelling techniques for data science to gain better organizational alignment around data projects and initiatives.</p>
<h3 id="-podcast-creating-smart-cities-with-data-science-https-www-datacamp-com-community-podcast-smart-cities-with-data-science-"><a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/community/podcast/smart-cities-with-data-science">Podcast: Creating Smart Cities with Data Science</a></h3>
<p>We’ve relaunched our DataFramed podcast! In this episode, Amen Ra Mashariki, former Chief Analytics Officer of New York City outlines the state of data science in government agencies, how he helped make the city of New York smarter, the state of data literacy in government, and more.</p>


https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/digest-may-2021

Read our favorite articles from the last month.

DataCamp Digest May 2021

<center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1620130652/DC_for_Classrooms_logo_u5cbrr.png" /></center><br>
<p>Today is Teachers’ Day in the United States and everyone at DataCamp wants to take this opportunity to give a resounding “Thank you!” to all of the amazing teachers in this country and around the world who have sacrificed so much to educate our children and keep them safe. As of today, US high school teachers are eligible to <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/groups/classrooms">register their own free Professional DataCamp account</a>. US high school teachers can now invite their students into their accounts for free access, just like college/university educators have been doing for years. They can assign 350+ courses, every project, Signal assessment, and more on desktop or mobile.</p>
<h2 id="history-of-datacamp-for-classrooms">History of DataCamp for Classrooms</h2>
<p>In 2017, <a target="_blank" href="https://medium.com/martijn-theuwissen/why-we-decided-to-give-up-10-of-our-revenue-6c9fbe7d4f81">we decided to give up 10% of our revenue</a> by giving free DataCamp access to postsecondary school instructors and professors as well as their students. We wanted to show the world that DataCamp was serious about democratizing data skills around the world. DataCamp believes that data education (like all education) <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/datacamp-classroom">is a basic human right</a>. Today, we’re elated to announce that 500,000 unique users have learned invaluable skills through DataCamp for Classrooms to date. Currently, over 100,000 students and teachers in over 3,750 classrooms are enrolled in DataCamp for Classrooms.</p>
<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1620075396/DataCamp_for_Classrooms_-_Data_1x_dnlxmr.png" /></center><br>
<p>So thank you, all 500,000 thousand of you, for making DataCamp for Classrooms the groundbreaking program it is today. Five hundred thousand humans might be hard to visualize, but we tried:</p>
<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1620129006/DataCamp_for_Classrooms_-_Visual_1x_ztoesl.png" /></center><br>
<h2 id="evolution-datacamp-for-classrooms-for-us-high-schools">Evolution: DataCamp for Classrooms for US High Schools</h2>
<p>Opening up DataCamp for Classrooms to high schools launches today as we recognize that secondary schools everywhere are struggling to become data literate in both the educational and administrative realms. <a target="_blank" href="https://csteachers.org/documents/en-us/e43c7636-849d-460c-96df-fa52b987dcd8/1">Less than half of American high schools have computer science programs</a>, and far less teach data science, specifically. Frustratingly, yet fittingly, there exists very little data on data science, analytics, or engineering education in US high schools. We see no reason why DataCamp can’t change that.</p>
<p>So we have. Every US high school teacher can now make a DataCamp for Classrooms account to get six months of Professional access for themselves and their students. All of the amazing features previously only available to college and university professors and their students are now ready to be deployed in high school classrooms from coast to coast. There’s never a need to purchase or download additional software as all learning happens in-browser. Teachers have access to crucial tools like Assignments, Progress Reporting, Signal skill assessments, while students can world-class data science training online or off, at home or on the go. All teachers need is a valid official school email address and a faculty page on the school’s website.</p>
<p>Teachers can even reapply after their first free semester of access for another one. There’s no limit to the number of free semesters an educator can get with DataCamp for the Classrooms, and the same goes for their students. We hope US high school teachers can also use this to complement their remote and/or hybrid teaching models to make sure their students are still getting the highest quality education. While DataCamp for Classrooms does not accept international secondary school teachers yet, they may still qualify for the same free access by <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/datacamp-donates-q1-2021">applying to DataCamp Donates</a>.</p>
<p>Teachers of the world: you all do so much more than you get credit for, especially during this pandemic. If you want to teach (or just learn) data science, DataCamp for Classrooms will save you considerable time and help you deliver a memorable experience to your students. We hope you take advantage of our offer to increase your school’s data literacy for free.</p>


https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/us-high-schools

On this Teachers’ Day, we salute the brave heroes educating the next generation and celebrate the 500,000 teachers and students who received DataCamp for Classrooms scholarships to date.

High school teachers and their students now have free access to DataCamp for Classrooms

https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/smart-cities-with-data-science

Amen Ra Mashariki deep dives into the state of data literacy in government agencies, the use cases he worked on to make the City of New York smarter, and more!

Creating Smart Cities With Data Science (Transcript)

Creating Smart Cities With Data Science

<center><a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/groups/business"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1603718763/banner_style_1_cruuf7.png" /></a></center><br>
<p>In a digital era of rapid technological advances, it is imperative that governments adopt data-driven approaches in order to provide value for citizens and become more efficient. In a <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/resources/webinars/democratizing-data-in-government-agencies">recent webinar</a>, Alex Scriven, Senior Data Scientist from the New South Wales Government in Sydney, Australia, shared his insights around data democratization in a government environment, inspiring use cases where government data was utilized to deliver positive impact, as well as actionable best practices for developing a data-driven culture in government agencies.</p>
<h2>What Is Data Democratization?</h2>
<p>Data democratization can be described as the situation where everyone in the organization (not only data professionals) has <strong>skills</strong>, <strong>confidence</strong>, and <strong>access</strong> to produce data-informed decisions. While this definition is highly generalizable, it has two specific dimensions in the government context:</p>
<ul>
<li>Democratizing data access and skills internally amongst government staff (i.e. within and across government agencies).</li>
<li>Providing transparency for citizens by making government data available for all—which is often referred to as open data.</li>
</ul>
<p>These two dimensions are related because a positive data culture within the government where skills and access are democratized, will motivate and inspire towards the concept of open data for its citizens as a flow-on effect.</p>
<h2>Why is Data Democratization Important in Government Agencies?</h2>
<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619727951/image_34_o9gk6t.png" /></center><br>
<p>There are multiple reasons to support the case for data democratization in the government. Let’s have a look at the top five reasons:</p>
<h4 id="1-shortage-of-talent">1.     Shortage of talent</h4>
<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619727952/image_35_mdge9a.png" /></center><br>
<p>It is well known that data talents are in short supply globally, with <a target="_blank" href="https://quanthub.com/data-scientist-shortage-2020/">Quanthub</a> reporting that there are three times more data science job postings than job searches. To make matters worse, this scarcity is felt especially keenly in the government sector. The ‘State of Data Science’ report by <a target="_blank" href="https://www.stitchdata.com/resources/the-state-of-data-science/">Stitch</a> revealed that only 1.2% of data scientists ply their trade in the government sector, a proportion much lower compared to numerous other industries.</p>
<p>This means that there will not be enough data practitioners to support all the units within government agencies. The solution is to work towards data democratization by building data skills amongst the broader non-technical employee base, such that they are able to initiate and undertake data-driven projects with confidence and competence.</p>
<h4 id="2-better-deployment-of-existing-talent">2.     Better deployment of existing talent</h4>
<p>Given the data talent shortage in the government sector, it is also crucial that existing talents are well managed and well deployed. In an ideal setting, data practitioners are using  their expertise to deliver the greatest value possible for agencies and citizens alike. In agencies where data is not democratized, data talent is often pigeonholed into creating dashboards and delivering value in the form of descriptive analytics (<a target="_blank" href="https://www.csc.gov.sg/articles/bring-data-in-the-heart-of-digital-government">Singapore Smart Nation &amp; Digital Government Office</a>).</p>
<p>If agencies focus on democratizing data skills and access, non-technical stakeholders will be empowered to draw their own descriptive analytics, and data practitioners’ focus will shift from descriptive analytics to predictive analytics and higher impact projects.  </p>
<p>Moreover, it is vital that these talents do not fall into the data support trap, where they face burgeoning workloads from all kinds of unfiltered requests. By providing them with the optimal working environment, it is also more likely that the government can retain these highly sought-after talents.</p>
<h4 id="3-deeper-insights">3.     Deeper Insights</h4>
<p>The non-data-savvy government staff are subject matter experts in their respective fields, meaning that there is a wealth of domain expertise waiting to be tapped into. Instead of imparting domain knowledge to data talents, it is wiser to develop the data skills of domain experts such that they can readily merge their expertise with technical abilities. By leveraging the existing domain knowledge, the agency can gather deeper insights by asking and answering business questions through data-driven approaches.</p>
<h4 id="4-overcome-speed-barriers">4.     Overcome Speed Barriers</h4>
<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619727951/image_36_x7wnlb.png" /></center><br>
<p>Government agencies are traditionally associated with slow processes stemming from bureaucracy and red tape. When engaging with data practitioners, this is exacerbated by time-consuming workflows involving iterative interactions between data talents and subject matter experts.</p>
<p>With domain experts empowered, they will instead be able to immediately explore the data by themselves, and discover answers to fundamental business questions without the need to involve data practitioners all the time.</p>
<h4 id="5-trust-and-open-data">5.     Trust and open data</h4>
<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619727951/image_37_ked72w.png" /></center><br>
<p>As discussed earlier, data democratization in a government setting can go beyond empowering staff with data skills and access, but also by opening government data up to citizens. The setup of an open data portal delivers many benefits to both the government and the citizens. For example, the citizens will value the higher level of transparency offered by the government, while the government can gain from the innovation fostered by the public and from inter-agency collaboration.</p>
<h2 id="use-cases-of-data-democratization-in-government-agencies">Use Cases of Data Democratization in Government Agencies</h2>
<p>The use cases of data democratization in government agencies are broad and many. In general, use cases can be categorized under three broad buckets: faster crisis response, improved operational efficiency, and improved citizen engagement and transparency.  </p>
<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619727951/image_38_ulujs5.png" /></center><br>
<h4 id="-1-improved-crisis-response">(1)  Improved Crisis response</h4>
<p>Equipping government agencies with the right data access and tools will allow them to mount rapid and optimal responses to major crises. <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/resources/webinars/democratizing-data-in-government-agencies">In the webinar</a>, Alex dives deep into a slew of use-cases, but a few stand out. For example, the World Bank and donor governments launched one of the largest disaster relief efforts in history for the <a target="_blank" href="https://blogs.worldbank.org/latinamerica/4-years-looking-back-openstreetmap-response-haiti-earthquake">Haiti 2010 earthquake</a>. This was driven by access to high-quality satellite imagery under open mapping schemes that facilitate public distribution and use. The Red Cross, for example, analyzed social media data to identify where storm victims are seeking refuge to optimize disaster response (<a target="_blank" href="https://expectexceptional.economist.com/improving-disaster-response-efforts-through-data.html">The Economist</a>).</p>
<p>The <a target="_blank" href="http://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/176511491287380986/pdf/114011-BRI-3-4-2017-11-49-44-WGSBigDataGovernmentFinal.pdf">West Africa 2014 Ebola crisis</a> also involved numerous public data innovations. For instance, Flowminder used cell phone data to predict potential disease transmission routes, while the Ebola Open Data Initiative allowed health officials to develop an open-source model for Ebola intervention simulations.</p>
<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619727952/image_39_sxccd6.png" /></center><br>
<h4 id="-2-improved-operational-efficiency">(2)   Improved operational efficiency</h4>
<p>Like in any organization, leveraging data at scale can provide massive gains in operational efficiency, and this is similarly seen in government settings. For example, with better deployment of data talent, the <a target="_blank" href="https://www.liberalforum.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/PUBLICATION_AI-in-e-governance.pdf">city of Berlin</a> was able to apply machine learning on its data to automatically identify fraudulent health bills of its civil servants, reducing tax payer money waste.</p>
<p>The UK Government was able to save £1.24 billion by leveraging descriptive analytics to analyze technology vendor spend and avoid excessive procurement costs. Moreover, in the US, the city of Kansas was able to utilize data to prioritize housing inspections, leading to an 11-fold decrease in inspection times, and improved outcomes for citizens. (<a target="_blank" href="https://datasmart.ash.harvard.edu/news/article/case-government-investment-analytics">Harvard Ash Center</a>)</p>
<h4 id="-3-improved-citizen-engagement-and-transparency">(3)   Improved citizen engagement and transparency</h4>
<p>There are numerous data-driven solutions to help promote engagement between the government and its citizens. For instance, the <a target="_blank" href="https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/governance/fostering-innovation-in-the-public-sector_9789264270879-en">Tunisian government</a> made use of social media data as a proxy to gauge citizens’ perceptions of the government. This is better compared to traditional household surveys as it is cheaper and can be done more regularly.</p>
<p>Another example can be found in Mexico, where the online <a target="_blank" href="http://mejoratuescuela.org">Mejora Tu Escuela</a> (improve your school) platform provides citizens with data on school performance — empowering parents to make educated decisions around where to place their children and get involved in improving the school. This is only one of the many open data use-cases covered throughout the webinar.  </p>
<h2 id="best-practices-of-democratizing-data-in-government-agencies">Best practices of democratizing data in government agencies</h2>
<p>Data democratization in government agencies requires a concerted effort in order to make it become a reality. Alex shared several valuable tips on how to get started and keep it going. In summary, it’s about empowering people with confidence, learning, tools, skills, and access to data to galvanize a data culture that drives improved outcomes.</p>
<p>Concretely, galvanizing a data culture in a government setting requires steps across a variety of levers from infrastructure, people, tools, organization, and processes. At the end of the day, the people in the government agencies are the most important piece as they are the most powerful force for groundswell democratization. Data democratization can be accelerated by consistently supporting and building up their skills and confidence, and reaching out to the passionate members to lead the transformation.</p>
<p>If you want to learn more about the steps government agencies can take to democratize data science, make sure to watch the <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/resources/webinars/democratizing-data-in-government-agencies">full recording of the webinar</a>.</p>
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https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/democratizing-data-in-government-agencies

Government agencies have access to troves of data. In order to fully harness its value, there needs to be a committed and coordinated effort towards data democratization within and across government agencies.

Democratizing Data in Government Agencies

<p>DataCamp Donates is nearing our goal of donating 25,000 subscriptions to people in need. We have been delighted to receive requests from nonprofit organizations around the world that are doing the commendable work of making their communities more data literate. In fact, our number of partners almost doubled in the first quarter of 2021.</p>
<br><center><a target="_blank" href="https://support.datacamp.com/hc/en-us/articles/360051596574-DataCamp-Donates-Frequently-Asked-Questions&amp;sa=D&amp;source=editors&amp;ust=1619544968344000&amp;usg=AOvVaw2K2BwThE-Qi2tsOaW8-DFf"><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619627737/DataCamp_Donates_Update_Q1_2021_lyvjb0.jpg" /></a></center><br>
<p>It has also been extremely heartwarming to see the outpouring of support for DataCamp Donates from the #DataCampCommunity across social media. We are especially grateful for the over 12,000 people who have watched our very special panel discussion <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/datacamp-donates-panel">Changing Lives Around the World with DataCamp Donates</a>, and we look forward to hosting more live broadcasts to showcase the inspiring work our partners are doing to educate their communities and help them get jobs in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).</p>
<p>In our last update, we projected to hit our goal of 25,000 subscriptions donated by July, but now it looks like we will achieve that goal considerably sooner. If your organization hasn’t applied to become a DataCamp Donates partner yet, what are you waiting for? Apply now before they’re all gone!</p>
<h2 id="become-a-datacamp-donates-partner">Become a DataCamp Donates Partner</h2>
<p>If you work for a nonprofit organization or governmental social welfare institution, follow these three easy steps to become a DataCamp Donates partner.</p>
<ol>
<li>First, send an email to <a href="mailto:donate@datacamp.com?subject=DataCamp Donates application&amp;body=Please include details of your organization’s goals and how you intend to use the donated subscriptions. Thank you, The DataCamp Donates team.">donate@datacamp.com</a> that details your organization’s goals and how you intend to use the donated subscriptions. Our team reads every email.</li>
<li>Next, qualified organizations will be invited to complete an official application form.</li>
<li>The final step is a meeting conducted on Zoom to finalize the terms of the partnership. We then donate the licenses to our new partner organization <strong>within 2-4 weeks</strong>.</li>
</ol>
<center><a href="mailto:donate@datacamp.com?subject=DataCamp Donates application&amp;body=Please include details of your organization’s goals and how you intend to use the donated subscriptions. Thank you, The DataCamp Donates team."><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619625650/image_33_zfsqve.png" /></a></center>
<h2 id="datacamp-for-classrooms-is-getting-a-special-update-">DataCamp for Classrooms is getting a special update...</h2>
<p>In Q1 alone, we gave six-month DataCamp scholarships to 60,000 teachers and students in colleges and universities around the world with our DataCamp for Classrooms program, the most of any quarter since its inception. We want to thank our global teaching community by making it even easier for more teachers and students of different backgrounds and skill levels to start learning on DataCamp (you guessed it) for free. Stay tuned to this blog space for news about the next great chapter of DataCamp for Classrooms!</p>


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DataCamp Donates Q1 2021 Update

<p>The ability to tell a high-quality story about an analysis or model is a key driver for adopting the solutions data scientists develop. In a <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/resources/webinars/storytelling-for-impactful-data-science">recent webinar</a>, Gert De Geyter, machine learning lead at Deloitte and Bhavya Dwivedi, data scientist at Deloitte discuss the importance of storytelling for data science and how to do it effectively.</p>
<h2 id="storytelling-enables-more-impactful-data-science">Storytelling Enables More Impactful Data Science</h2>
<p>Data scientists investigate, analyze, and communicate data insights in the form of descriptive, predictive, and prescriptive analytics. Broadly, there are four competency areas to become an effective data scientist:</p>
<ol>
<li>Data analysis</li>
<li>Machine learning and statistics</li>
<li>Big data technologies</li>
<li>Storytelling and communication</li>
</ol>
<p>Data scientists with formal education are heavily exposed to the first three but do not receive much education in communicating effectively. In the webinar, Gert mentions that by running  rough analysis over data science and AI conferences, just 1% of <a target="_blank" href="https://www.kdnuggets.com/meetings/index.html">data science and AI conferences</a> from 2018 to 2020 discussed storytelling.</p>
<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619470444/image_27_ag7gzi.png" /></center><br>

<p>Despite this underrepresentation of data science storytelling in education, data scientists must learn these skills if they want to become effective in their careers. In <a target="_blank" href="https://hbr.org/2019/07/building-the-ai-powered-organization">Building the AI-Powered Organization</a>, researchers found that 89% of companies with successful A.I. implementations that participated in their survey spent more than half of their analytics budgets on adoption activities, which included communication and training.</p>

<p>Data literacy plays an important part in aligning data science with non-technical stakeholders. This explains why organizations are spending so much on communication and training. <a target="_blank" href="https://www.accenture.com/us-en/insights/artificial-intelligence-summary-index">Accenture found</a> that 84% of business executives believe A.I. is required to achieve growth objectives. However, many executives do not have formal education in this field, further increasing the need for improved data literacy and effective communication throughout the organization.</p>
<p>As AI becomes increasingly more prevalent, understanding data and communicating it correctly to the audience is essential to driving value in business settings with technical and non-technical stakeholders. Accurately describing the potential for A.I. to drive business outcomes in a specific context is crucial to allow stakeholders to make correct decisions that lead to positive business outcomes. A very common pitfall is to exaggerate its potential.</p>

<p>Communication is necessary for scaling the impact of data science in an organization—as end-user acceptance and alignment between executives and data teams are essential. The most effective form of this is storytelling. Storytelling helps the audience connect with the presenter and remember the content. This connection is supported by <a target="_blank" href="https://www.pnas.org/content/107/32/14425">neural coupling theory</a>. Stories also play an important role in how we remember the past—through effective storytelling, we help the audience connect with us as a presenter and remember the important content, which leads to a better understanding of how a model or analysis can impact the organization.</p>

<h2>Understand Your Audience</h2>
<p>The first step to effective storytelling is understanding the audience. A great story needs to be accessible to the people you are communicating with. A strong understanding of the audience’s data fluency, goals for the organization, and relationship to you and the organization should be heavily integrated into the story.</p>

<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619470444/image_28_pcjftt.png" /></center><br>

<p>Answers to these questions will help inform how to best tell a story that drives the intended outcomes from the presentation. They help us as presenters know what to emphasize, how to communicate so that the audience understands the content, and what types of information will help lead to the desired outcome based on what motivates the audience in making decisions. When the audience is very broad, it’s important to identify the specific people in the audience the presentation is intended to reach.</p>

<p>Understanding the audience helps inform the order in which the story is told. There are three key parts of effective storytelling with data:</p>
<ol>
<li>The goal and message,</li>
<li>Context and</li>
<li>Arguments, and flow.</li>
</ol>
<p>Generally, technical stakeholders prefer the story to be told starting with the arguments and ending with the conclusion. Decision-makers prefer the message to start with the recommendation or conclusion and end with the arguments and support.</p>
<h2>Make the Story Transparent and Actionable</h2>
<p>Understanding what story is being told is also important. <a target="_blank" href="https://www.ibm.com/blogs/research/2019/08/ai-explainability-360/">IBM found</a> that 68% of business leaders think that customers will want improved explanations from A.I. in the next three years. Ease of explanation is heavily impacted by the decision to use a black box or white box model.</p>

<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619470444/image_29_xzd5te.png" /></center><br>

<p>Black box models typically perform better but are significantly (if not impossibly) harder to interpret. White box models are simpler and typically do not perform as well but are a lot easier to explain. When possible, using white box models will lead to better stories. However, some high-dimensional problems are not possible to accurately model using white box techniques. Thus, the business context is important in making this decision.</p>

<p>Accurately describing what a model’s output represents is also very important. Many models describe correlative associations between the response and predictors, not causal. Describing this distinction to non-technical stakeholders is critical to making the correct data-driven decision that will create value for an organization. A model’s prediction does not represent the best possible business decision and this needs to be included in an effective story. If there is a causal relationship, this must be accurately portrayed as well.</p>

<h2>How to Tell an Effective Story</h2>
<p>Now that we understand the key considerations about the audience and content of the story, we can effectively tell the story. While there are entire books on this topic, we will cover the basics in this section.</p>

<p>The first thing to consider is what format the presentation will be in: written or live presentation.  Written presentations give the presenter less control over how the audience perceives the information while presenters in a live demonstration can point the audience in the intended direction verbally. Understanding how people’s attention typically works clarifies the best placement for content on the page to guide the intended experience.</p>

<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619470444/image_30_wzrxm0.png" /></center><br>

<p>In Cole Nussbaumer’s book, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.storytellingwithdata.com/">Storytelling with data</a>, she emphasizes the importance of minimalism in visualizations. Removing the background and unnecessary labels and using color for emphasis help us tell significantly clearer stories by directing our audience’s attention to what matters. As we see in the below example from her book, by improving the default excel graph (on the left), we immediately understand that after two employees quit, the organization was receiving more volume than it could process. This story helps HR understand that two more employees need to be hired and the exact reason for this. This visualization tells a powerful story that helps drive a data-driven business decision with very little cognitive effort for the decision-maker.</p>

<br><center><img src="https://res.cloudinary.com/dyd911kmh/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto:best/v1619470444/image_31_gmakuq.png" /></center><br>

<p>This is a powerful example that demonstrates what good storytelling looks like. We can significantly change the way someone approaches our visualization through color, annotations, and graph selection.</p>

<h2>Make Data Science Accessible in Organizations</h2>
<p>We see through many large-scale executive surveys how much emphasis organizations are placing on data science and artificial intelligence as soon as possible. Making these systems accessible begins with improved data literacy in organizations. Data literacy allows non-technical stakeholders to easily access and make data-driven decisions that create value. The most effective way to present this type of information is through stories that take the audience and context into account while making design decisions that attract attention to the correct places.  If you want to dive deeper into best practices for effective storytelling for data science, make sure to watch the <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/resources/webinars/storytelling-for-impactful-data-science">full webinar</a> recording.</p>

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https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/storytelling-for-more-impactful-data-science

The ability to tell a high-quality story about data insights is hugely important for data scientists to thrive in an organization.  Find out how to leverage storytelling to scale the impact of data science in your organization.

Storytelling for More Impactful Data Science

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<p>The past year has been incredibly difficult, and that’s a big understatement. But one of the silver linings is the shift to digital work—and that includes online training and education.</p>
<p>To accelerate their digital transformation, many organizations have started using <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/groups/business">DataCamp for Business</a> to improve data literacy across teams. Individuals who have been laid off from their jobs due to COVID have used their skills learned on DataCamp <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/patrick">to land new jobs</a> in data science and analytics. Through <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/datacamp-donates">DataCamp Donates</a>, our partner communities have allocated free DataCamp subscriptions to learners in over 60 countries. And many schools and universities have used <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/groups/classrooms">DataCamp for Classrooms</a> to supplement their online education programs at no cost.</p>
<p>DataCamp’s mission is data democratization. That’s why from April 22 to 30, we’re hosting a Free Week, opening up access to our entire platform to anyone and everyone who wants to try DataCamp for free. (The first chapter of all of our courses is <strong><em>always</em></strong> free.) You can take as many <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/courses">courses</a>, <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/projects">projects</a>, and <a target="_blank" href="http://datacamp.com/signal">assessments</a> as you want—and we won’t even ask for your credit card number. There’s no catch. All you need is an email address to get started.</p>
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<p>Our first Free Week was <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/free-week">last May</a>, and we hosted another one in <a target="_blank" href="https://www.datacamp.com/community/blog/free-week-2">September</a>. We saw hundreds of thousands of learners join us to learn new skills to further their careers. Are you ready to take ownership of your future? Sign up for unlimited access to DataCamp from April 22 to 30 at <a target="_blank" href="datacamp.com/freeweek">datacamp.com/freeweek</a>.</p>
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