Who is A Data Scientist?
Data science is among the most prominent emerging careers in the 21st century. Data scientists are professionals responsible for gathering, evaluating, and interpreting large amounts of data.
This career is made up of people who have acquired technical skills that enable them to solve complex analytical problems and also find ways that Data can improve service delivery and quality of life.
Essential Skills You Need As A Data Scientist
- Education: Data scientists are highly educated professionals and while there are notable exceptions, a good educational background is usually required to develop the depth of knowledge necessary to be a data scientist.
- R programming language: R is specifically designed for data science needs, as it can be used for statistical analysis, graphics representation, and reporting. Acquiring an in-depth knowledge of this programming language helps Data scientist develop statistical software and data analysis.
- Python Coding: Python is the most common coding language typically required in data science roles, along with Java, Pel, or C/C++. Python is a great programming language for data scientists.
- Hadoop Platform: It is not always a requirement, but preferred in many cases. Therefore, having an experience with Hive would be a strong selling point. Familiarity with cloud tools such as Amazon S3 can also be beneficial.
- SQL Database/Coding: Although Hadoop and NoSQL are now an integral part of data science, it is still expected that a data scientist must be able to write and execute complex queries in SQL(Structure Query Language).
Prominent Data Scientist in 2021
- Geoffrey Hinton
- Jeff Hammerbacher
- DhanurjayPatil
- Alex Pentland
- Dean Abbott
- Yann Lecun
- Nando’de Freitas
- Sebastian Thrun
- Fei-Fei Li
- Andrew Ng
Data Science Careers Shaping The Future
1. Data Scientist
Average Salary: $139,840
Typical Job Requirements: Data scientists analyse large amounts of complex raw and processed information to find patterns that will develop organizations and help steer vital business decisions.
2. Machine Learning Engineer
Average Salary: $114,826
Typical Job Requirements: They create data funnels and work on software solutions. They often require strong statistics and programming skills and software engineering knowledge.
3. Machine Learning Scientist(Research Scientist or Engineer)
Average Salary: $114,121
Typical Job Requirements: They research new data approaches and algorithms that will be applied in adaptive systems.
4. Applications Architect
Average Salary: $113,757
Typical Job Requirements: Application architects concentrate on designing the architecture of applications and building components (e.g. user interface and infrastructure). They monitor the behaviour of applications used within a business and their interaction with one another and the users.
5. Enterprise Architect
Average Salary: $110,663
Typical Job Requirements: Enterprise architects are conferred with the responsibility of aligning the company’s ideas with the right technology to help actualize these goals and ideas optimally.
6. Data Architect
Average Salary: $108,278
Typical Job Requirements: They create new database systems, develop ways of improving the performance and functionality of existing systems and provide access to database administrators and analysts.
7. Infrastructure Architect(Cloud Infrastructure Architect)
Average Salary: $107,309
Typical Job Requirements: Ensure optimum functionality of all business systems and support the development of new technologies and system requirements.
8. Data Engineer
Average Salary: $102,864
Typical Job Requirements: Data engineers build and maintain data pipelines which make information accessible for data scientists. They also perform batch or real-time processing on gathered and stored data.
9. Business Intelligence(BI) developer
Average Salary: $81,514
Typical Job Requirements: BI developers design and develop methods to enable business users to find the necessary information to make better business decisions.
10. Statistician
Average Salary: $76,884
Typical Job Requirements: Statisticians work to collect, analyse and interpret data to enable them to identify trends and relationships that can be used to inform organizational decision making.
11. Data Analyst
Average Salary: $62, 453
Typical Job Requirements: Data analysts transform and manipulate large data sets to suit the desired analysis of companies. They also aid in the decision-making process.
Read more on Who is a Data Scientist
Educational Requirements
To become a Data Scientist, you will need at least a Bachelor’s degree in Data Science, Mathematics, Statistics, or Computer Science. This means your secondary school subjects must be within these fields or those related to them. Your university education is more direct as a good number of schools offer coursework which covers Data Science in their Degree programs. Below are a few universities offering accredited programs.
Swansea University in the United Kingdom: Offers a BSc (Hons) in Computer Science. The tuition for international students is £ 16,650 and you can study for 3 years full-time or 4 years full-time with industry work. A Computer Science degree from this university will help you develop skills to identify Data solutions and measure their efficiency. Other transferable skills you will learn are team-working, communication, presentation, and problem-solving skills. The university also offers an MSc in Data Science, if you are interested in further study. The tuition is £ 18,000 for international students and you can choose to study for 1 year full-time or 2 years part-time.
Carleton University in Canada: Offers a B.C.S Honours in Computer Science. The tuition for international students is CAD 33,281. The degree also gives provision for concentration in different aspects of Computer Science. At Carleton University, you will learn to use computing and information technology to help solve the problems that we face in business, science, and society today, as well as those to come.
Kent State University in the United States of America: Offers a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science. The tuition is $21,400 for international students, however, the tuition may vary if you choose to go for a part-time mode of study. The degree will teach you how to understand, design and build complex computer software systems.
