In 2017, Natalee Morris graduated from Pitt’s undergraduate program with a Bachelor of Science in Math-Econ. To pursue a master’s degree in quantitative economics, Natalee left her full-time position at a medical equipment company to further her education with Pitt’s MQE program. Natalee is currently a Data Scientist at Moody’s Analytics.
Q: How has the MQE Program provided you with the skills needed to succeed in your current position as a Data Scientist at Moody’s Analytics?
A: “The MQE program gave me the necessary tools to learn and work in the data science field. Most importantly, MQE provided me with the mindset and critical thinking skills to embrace how unpredictable working in this field can be and how to adapt to it.”
Q: What did you love learning about the most during your time in the MQE Program?
A: “I enjoyed Economic Inference from Data, as it introduced me to different kinds of modeling used in the field and the proper times to use those models when addressing a problem. I also learned a lot from Big Data and Forecasting, because it introduced me to Machine Learning, which is something I plan to pursue at my current job at Moody’s Analytics. Both classes gave me a crash course in R or Python. I found the learn on your feet environment that these classes had was frustrating but proved to be beneficial in the workforce.”
Q: How did you implement skills from the MQE Program into your Capstone with the US Affordable Housing Shortage? What valuable skills did you learn from this project?
A: “The most valuable thing I learned from my Capstone is that getting from problem to solution is not a linear process. There were many times my group and I had valid ideas/strategies that did not pan out. We had to go back to the drawing board and start over. There were times where it felt like barely anything was getting done, or that progress was moving too slowly. Despite being frustrated, every bump in the road was a great learning experience that helped my team and I become better critical thinkers and data scientists.”
Q: How did the MQE Program help prepare you for real-world career experience?
A: “MQE teaches you to learn on the fly. We all want to move onto jobs where there will be a nice grace period of training and easing into the work. That may happen for some people, but not for others. Day three of my new position I was given a project to work on and had no idea how to approach it. I had no teammates, only advisors who had their own work to get back to. Thankfully, I had my MQE experience to lean on. After spending a year in the MQE Program, facing the uncertainty of my job did not feel so daunting. I knew that with enough time and effort I would reach a solution in the same way I finished certain assignments for class.”