...do not be afraid of try something new and explore as many opportunities as you can. You may find your true passion when exploring new options!

My name is Wenjing and I am a fourth-year student in the Honours Mathematics & Statistics Co-op (Statistics Specialization) program with a minor in Economics. I finished my first co-op work term at a start-up company as a product sourcing specialist, where I aimed to find suitable products and use data analysis tools to predict and assess the product’s viability for online arbitrage.

Honours Mathematics & Statistics is one of the fasted growing programs in the Faculty of Science. This program is unique because of the flexibility it gives to students in first year. This flexibility gave me many opportunities to prepare for the co-op, try different things, and explore a variety of courses, which lead me to pursue a Statistics Specialization.

Before entering university, I was interested in the Actuarial & Financial Mathematics, therefore, I took some basic courses about that. However, after first year, I realized the Statistics was my true passion and allowed me to develop the necessary skills required for my future career. This program is not only focused on theoretical knowledge like Linear Algebra, Calculus, Modeling, but also taught different programming languages that are useful for the future. When I started my co-op work-term, I found that I was using data analysis skills learned in my program to analyze graphs in order to come up with the best sourcing plan to increase turnover rate.

If I could give some piece of advice to incoming Science students, it would be, do not be afraid of try something new and explore as many opportunities as you can. You may find your true passion when exploring new options!

Good luck with university and enjoy life at McMaster!