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Research is the biggest driving force behind innovation and success. It is also the main reason why many of us are drawn to higher education. It is the bread and butter of what we do and why we do it. It is the motivation behind all those underpaid hours we spend in front of our computers designing surveys, crunching numbers, reviewing the literature, making grant deadlines, tediously crafting and re-crafting study protocols, running experiments, going through zillions of revisions on our manuscripts… 

In a previous blog I wrote about an exciting project on transportation in cities that, along with some colleagues, I’ve had the opportunity to work on.

Those who are new to data science are recommended by data science blogs and data scientists to pursue side projects. These side projects should showcase your skill set and help you create a foundation for your portfolio. The job industry places a large emphasis on ones “research portfolio” as an important piece of landing a job. Despite this sound logic, I pursue side projects for different reasons.. 

Last year, some friends discovered that I didn’t use the digital assistant on my phone, very often. This seemed counterintuitive, given that I am a linguist interested specifically in speech, including speech recognition. So, as an exercise, I reactivated my “Hey Siri” feature and said “Hey Siri” a handful of times into my microphone when prompted. I have since embarked on my journey to talk to a rectangular piece of plastic and glass, with varying degrees of success.