Meet Carmen Wickware

What was your program of study?

Bioinformatics, M.S. Online

What field were you working in when you started this program?

I came in with more of the life sciences, microbiology background, but without the program at NYU I would be nowhere near where I am right now. I would have had to learn all of this sort of on the fly.

I did actually have some research experience in microbiology and wanted to be able to sort of translate that into working with the actual genomes and RNA, and everything.

What was your goal or reason for applying to this program?

The reason I applied to NYU was because I was so fascinated with where biology and just kind of science in general was moving, and that's like big data analysis.

Can you please describe the online learning experience and how your classes were structured?

The opportunity was great, because the professors had set up time to talk to us. If we needed an individual meeting there was always time during classes for questions. I never felt like I didn't have a resource to go to when I was maybe not understanding something, and then I became that resource for some other students.

So I think that the way that the NYU bioinformatics program is structured is very much focused on like student success um, and that is a wonderful thing. It was the best experience I've had as far as schooling goes, and let me tell you I've been in school for a long time.

What was your favorite course or course(s) taken?

There was a lot of programming, a lot of statistics and some mathematics looking at the algorithms that go into all of the programs that we use. And when I say programming, I mean, we learned Perl and Python and basically did that so that we are, or I am able to create my own scripts, to go through the ah genomes, or whatever I happen to be looking at ah myself! While also being able to understand what I learned in the bioinformatics program has basically set me up for where I am now.

I loved all of my classes. I loved learning about Perl and Python.

Would you recommend this program to others and why or why not?

I definitely recommend this program to anyone who is trying to get into bioinformatics. If you have bioinformatics skills already. You can sort of further them into one of the specific disciplines.