NYANYA

Passion and desire for knowledge have been the most valuable characteristics from my early childhood until now. My interests for new ideas combined with my desire and passion enabled me to gain a significant amount of knowledge, as well as led me to a successful educational career. I also believe that people learn the best through practice. Integrating small pieces of knowledge into the real world and exploring secrets outside of textbooks help enhance my grasp of knowledge. Statistics is such a practical discipline that matches my beliefs. My interest in statistics derives from my curiosity. During my undergraduate years, I always question myself as to how could these statistical models and mathematical equations perform their impacts in real world? How important is their role? How could statistics contribute to the society? With these curiosities, I decide that it is necessary for me to pursue further education in statistical science. Moreover, as massive data is produced everyday through web sources and company records, a great prospect of a related career can be easily identified. I felt that data and statistics could be utilized in plenty of fields. Hence, I set my career goal to be a statistical analyst. This career goal originated from my academic background and also my professional experiences.

My journey towards the study of statistics started when I was 15 years old. I came to the United States as a high school exchange student with a burning passion to study new knowledge outside of my home country. Different environments and different experiences have forged me into a confident, independent, and also a hard-working individual. As a high school student, I discovered my interests in mathematics more than other subjects. I was selected to represent my school to participate in a high school mathematics contest hosted by the local university’s math department and received third place. The rapid development of my interest in mathematics-related subjects has influenced me to choose mathematical science as my major field of study in college. Hence, I selected professional mathematics as my major field of study with a concentration in statistics at Middle Tennessee State University. I have been exposed to several topics of study such as Stochastic Processes, Regression Analysis, Forecasting Analysis, and Probability. My hard work coupled with self-confidence rewarded me with a Grade Point Average of 3.7 for my major courses. My major with concentration in statistics equipped me with solid mathematics background as well as programming skills.

It is my conviction that a successful professional is not built merely out of reading textbooks but also through the acquisition of knowledge from other sources. With a passion to apply what I have learned into real-world practice, I filled my summers with internships. My first practical experience was in 2013 at Shenyang Statistics District Bureau in China. It familiarized me with the process of data collecting and data sampling; it ignited my interest in data and statistics. For the following summer, I was selected as an intern at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. During my internship at Vanderbilt University Center for Human Genetics Research (CHGR), I participated in the research topic Network-based stratification Analysis of 13 Major Cancer Types Using Mutations in Panels of Cancer Genes and published the corresponding research paper in BioMed Central Genomics. The motivation of this project is that Network-based stratification (NBS) approaches has been shown to achieve a better classification of tumor subtypes. Often times, only small panels of genes are used in research, it is not clear whether such as reduced panel can achieve a similarly good performance. Thus, our goal is to apply the NBS approach to examine the performance with several reduced panels of genes. During the project, I was trained to perform several key operations on patient data such as Network Smoothing and Network Clustering using R programming language. During my internship, my efficient work on creating more than 500 clustering patterns images within a week enable our group to submit the research paper before our scheduled date. Later, I was honored to present our progress on the project during weekly staff meetings. Working at such an outstanding place and working with several eminent professors and research fellows was invaluable for me. The experience broadened my vision of statistics and its diversity of applications. As I mentioned earlier, I always have the curiosity that how could statistics play its role in real life. This internship experience answered my question perfectly; a set of useful data and statistics can bring medical research to a big leap in order to cure more cancers and save more lives. Moreover, I believe statistics can be utilized in plenty lo fields other than medical science. All these factors motivate me even more to make a difference in the statistical industry. The process of applying theoretical work into practice intrigued me, and I am excited that more knowledge is waiting for me to discover and learn. Therefore, a graduate study of Statistics at Indiana University-Bloomington would be a major step toward my pursuits.

While my academic and internship experience reinforced my interest and demonstrated my professional proficiency, it also helped me identify the areas that I would like to strengthen through graduate study. With strong dedication to the field, a further study in statistics is certainly the most appropriate choice for me at this stage. I have determined that a dedicated study on Statistics will enable me to accumulate my knowledge and experience of the field and encourage me in achieving my career goal. The rigorous curriculum and multidimensional learning resources of outstanding IU’s M.S. in Statistics could definitely equip me with solid theoretical foundations as well as practical knowledge, and prepare me well for further real-world challenges. I believe my coursework along with my mathematics background will allow me to function well within the program. I would be grateful to you if I would be given the opportunity to pursue my graduate studies at Indiana University-Bloomington. If admitted in this program, I will contribute to the program with my passion and ambition of applying statistics in the industry as well as my cross-cultural experiences. I am looking forward to satisfying and developing my passion starting at Indiana University-Bloomington.