Ruhi Doshi
Let's start off with the basics. So, what is your year, major, and hometown?
I'm a third year. I'm a Data Science and Operations Research and Management Science (ORMS) major, and I'm from Minnesota.
Why or how did you choose this major?
What actually happened was I was doing a research project in high school, and it was with the Computer Science department mentor, but I ended up working with sample data from pedestrians in New York City, and I really enjoyed the whole process of finding data, processing it and drawing some statistical inference after doing [hotspot] analysis onto it. I thought that it was super cool to use programming, math, and statistics in combination. And then once i was looking at the coursework for the newly announced Data Science major at Berkeley, I was like "Okay, this is 100% what I want to do."
What is a fun fact about yourself?
I have set fire to a classroom before in high school. It was part of this science club I was in and I had to look at how different types of fibers burn in order to compete in this event, and I ended up taking a giant glob of polyester. And based on my notes, it was supposed to shrivel up a little bit, but because I took such a big blob, I ended up setting a fire to the whole thing. I dropped it onto the lab table, which was covered in paper towels, and the entire thing went up in flames.
That's crazy. What did you guys do afterwards?
Well, it was in a science lab classroom. The teacher who was supervising me glanced up after I called her name a couple times, and she was like, "Hmm, okay. Just let it burn out." And I sat there and just watched it burn for 5 minutes.
What are some of your hobbies or interests?
I really like hiking. I've gotten back into playing piano over quarantine, and I'm learning some Coldplay and Adele songs. I watch Netflix and read fantasy novels. I also really like astronomy, so I spend a lot of time doing research for a certain lab.
Why did you change from applied math?
I took 61a and like the thinking process used to solve these kinds of problems. Math wasn't showing me this stuff. It was a lot more theoretical – CS was a lot more tangible.
What are your professional interests?
I'm still kind of figuring it out. I know I want to do something with data science and a quantitative career, but I don't know exactly what domain. I'm pretty open. As I've taken more IEOR classes I've started to think finance and FinTech is really interesting.
Do you have any internship experience you'd like to share about?
So last summer, I was an intern for Amazon Web Services. And I was working on integrating one of their cloud machine learning technologies into a chatbot, and I was able to optimize this part of the chatbot so it could support twice as many users as before.
What are your other campus involvements?
It's primarily SAAS, and I do research through URAP with the Berkeley Lab. There's an astronomy collaboration there, which includes investigating the expansion of the dark energy universe, and I work with the Data Team lead there to create models that identify different deep space objects as well as create their processing and visualization dashboards. I am also a TA for Data 8!
How did you find out about SAAS? And why did you join?
I found out about SAAS actually through somebody else in high school who used to be involved in this club. They were like, "You should come to the general meeting," and I did, and it was great. I joined then in the first semester of my freshman year at Berkeley in the CX committee. I just really liked the community and how people were social but also academically driven.
Which SAAS committee was your favorite and why?
Oh, that's a hard question. Well, I guess as far as which committees I've been in, I was in the CX committee my first semester, and then I joined Web Dev my second semester, and we got to play a lot of Avalon game nights and other social-related things, so that was really fun. And then I was in DC for three semesters after that, and I also really enjoyed that because I think you get to be in a smaller subteam in SAAS, you get to know everyone really well, and that's when I felt like I found more of a community. Plus, you get to work on some really cool things, I'd say. I can't really choose a favorite, but I had the most fun being in Web Dev and in DC.
What was the reason that you stayed in SAAS?
I stayed absolutely for the people. There's literally no other club on campus where I can argue about optimal and suboptimal Avalon strategies. Everybody is just super chill who's willing to do study nights as well as other socials. So definitely the people.
What is your proudest accomplishment in SAAS?
I guess it's not an accomplishment per se, but personally I have really enjoyed how to take super technical stuff that we learn and present it to a client who may not be as technical. I think that starting to understand how to do that conversion and communicate about different levels have been personally rewarding for me because it's something that I've struggled with.
How has SAAS positively impacted your career or professional development?
I think SAAS has been single-handedly responsible for most of my professional development. I've dealt with asking career, resume, and interview questions to older members as well as working on projects that give me quantifiable resume skills. The chance to pick up new techniques or data science tools, or finishing a project where you can say "Hey, we've improved on this model by x percent" and having that on your resume and being able to talk about the challenges you faced has been crucial.
Do you have a favorite SAAS memory?
Definitely. There was one Avalon board game night. We only played one Avalon game for three hours, and we spent the entire time arguing about which strategy was better in order to figure out who the final assassin is. One of the two people who were arguing was actually the assassin. So that's probably my favorite memory.
How did you make friends with people in SAAS, and how did you meet them?
I started going to socials, and I also started pinging the classes channels back when we had classes channels on our Slack and asking people to study and be like, "Hey, have you done this? I can help with this." Even if I didn't always get a response, just being very proactive and seeing, "Hey, maybe this is a person I can connect with" is nice. Oh, and I also enjoyed Donutbot. That was a really effective way to get to know people quickly. Back when we were in person, we would play Assassin on campus, so it led to really interesting "Hey, I saw you. I'm gonna run in the other direction now" type of moments.
The three SAAS values are community, exploration, and mentorship. Which one relates to you the most and why?
I think mentorship is probably the one that I would abide with the most in SAAS. Part of it is that everyone I know in SAAS is super helpful. You can literally ask anybody what their experience is on something or what their thoughts are, and they will take time out of their day and will sit down to help you out directly or write you notes or whatever it is. As an IA director this semester, I hope I get to do more of that for the members too.
What is your favorite class, and why?
My favorite is Data 102. I think it's because at that point we [have a strong probability background] that the math and linear algebra becomes secondary. And you get to learn super cool hypothesis stuff or real-world applications of data science. We spent so much last semester about how to control error rates and implement anonymization methods. I just thought it was really interesting, and it's also given me a chance to explain some of these concepts in interview talking points. So I think it's really cool going deep into data science design techniques.
Who is your favorite professor?
Okay, that one I just can't answer that well. So for Prob 140, I really enjoyed learning from Professor Adhikari. Oh, and I would like to give a shoutout to Alex Filippenko for Astro C10. I just loved that class and he brought so much energy and enthusiasm to it. I think I went to office hours twice a week when I was taking his class and we would sit there for a couple hours just talking about fun astronomy things.
What is your favorite spot on campus that more people should know about?
I really enjoy sitting at the Environmental Design Library. Sometimes it's a little bit busy, but it's completely out of the way, and most of the time it's ridiculously quiet. Plus, there's food downstairs, and it's just another pretty section of campus that I go to a lot. Also, there's this brewery up on Northside that's called the Brewed Awakening, and it's an underrated coffee shop, but definitely a place more people should go to.
What is your favorite place to study at on campus?
It's East Asian Library. Like the windows are huge! I feel like I'm sitting in some kind of Harry Potter world when I'm in that library.
What is the prettiest building on campus?
Well, it's not Evans. Honestly, the best views on campus are from Evans because you can't see Evans. Okay, the prettiest building on campus — I'll go with Campbell Hall. Actually, I'm replacing my answer for the spot on campus that more people should know about with the Telescope on Campbell Hall. They do viewings in the fall semester every Thursday night or something, and you can go up the Telescope and you can see the planets, or stars, or whatever else they could show at night. It's like almost every week.