Student Spotlight: Alyssa Columbus

Alyssa Columbus, a second-year PhD student in the Department of Biostatistics, is a Vivien Thomas and CERSI Scholar. Alyssa has over seven years of statistical industry and research experience, including as a data scientist, information security analyst, and consultant. 

Alyssa is a member of the NASA Datanaut corps and recently gave a talk at the Year of Open Science Culminating Conference, hosted by the Center for Open Science (COS) and NASA, about the duality of openness and security and how to enhance open science with robust standards and guidelines for protecting sensitive information. 

• Hometown: Southern California
• Previous Degrees Earned: BS in Mathematics, University of California-Irvine; MS in Applied and Computational Mathematics, Johns Hopkins Whiting School of Engineering
• Current Program: Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
• Program Entry Year: 2022
• Area of Focus: Public health informatics and data science, including educational interventions, ethical considerations (e.g., privacy and security), and policy implications.

What led you to Hopkins and choosing to study biostatistics? 

At the beginning of my undergraduate studies, I was fascinated by the vast array of quantitative approaches one could use to analyze raw data, draw statistical inference, and ultimately improve people’s lives with more robust forms of evidence. This motivated me to take as many statistics courses as I could, gain professional experience working with data across a broad range of use cases via internships, and participate in research projects that used statistical methods to advance our understanding of our collective health, including one led by an epidemiologist and a biostatistician. The intellectual stimulation and personal fulfillment I found from these research experiences, along with my full-time career (in data science and information security/privacy) and my master’s thesis (on neural survival models), led me to decide to pursue a PhD in biostatistics. I was thrilled when I was admitted to this program because many of the methods that I had been using or reading about in my research were developed by professors in this department, and several of the resources I used to build my computational skillset were made by members of the Department’s Johns Hopkins Data Science Lab (DaSL). 

Have you had any internships or jobs that have been helpful in your biostatistics learning journey?

I think all of the research experiences, internships, and jobs I’ve had across different disciplines have been helpful in their own ways because they’ve enabled me to have a more holistic view of what biostatistics is and could be. That being said, I think that the parts of my career where I’ve learned the most have been (1) my first research experiences that exposed me to critically thinking about the limitations of applying particular statistical methods to complex problems, (2) my hands-on experiences in working with large, messy datasets, and (3) my experiences educating others about various aspects of data science as a result of the NASA Datanauts program.

What do you like most about the Biostatistics Department?

It would have to be the culture–specifically its unique blend of intellectual prowess and a fun and friendly sense of community. I’m grateful to be a part of a department that has such a rich history of influential methods development (e.g., generalized estimating equations) and educational firsts (e.g., Coursera Data Science MOOCs) yet is also down-to-earth enough to the point where I, as a graduate student, can regularly have hallway conversations or eat lunch in the Genome Café with the professors who first came up with these ideas.

What has been your favorite class so far at Hopkins? 

I liked all of the classes in the statistical programming and computing series, but my favorite had to be Statistical Programming Paradigms and Workflows, taught by Stephanie Hicks. I appreciated how thorough each of her lectures were, how she occasionally brought in subject matter experts to give guest lectures to the class, and how each project developed a skill that I would later use in my research. I was also honored to have the opportunity to give a guest lecture on SQL and relational databases the following year and relay my experiences with SQL’s many flavors to other students.

Tell us about a project you are currently working on that you are excited about.

For the past few months, I’ve been working on a qualitative study I designed with my two co-advisors (Brian Caffo and Stephanie Hicks) and Roger Peng that aims to answer the question, “When is a data analysis done?”  I’ve learned a lot of valuable lessons so far by interviewing experienced data analysts from different fields and sectors. After conducting a few more interviews, I look forward to writing about their perspectives on what criteria they use to determine when an analysis can be considered complete (if ever). With 15 interviews in total, the rich dataset collected for this project will enable us to identify potential areas for improvement in data analysis practices and contribute to the development of more universally applicable analytical strategies.  

I’m grateful that this Department has fostered such a supportive environment where I’ve been able to learn so much from so many faculty members, all of whom I hope to emulate in different ways as I advance in my career.

Can you share why the Biostatistics program is important to your career trajectory?

As I’ve progressed in my career, I’ve realized that I feel the most fulfilled when conducting research and educating others about what I’ve learned through writing, speaking, and teaching. Although I’ve been fortunate to have many opportunities to develop these skills before starting my Biostatistics PhD at the Bloomberg School of Public Health, I feel privileged that, in this program, I’ve had the chance to learn from professors who are leaders at the forefront of both statistics and their respective scientific fields. From receiving guidance on accomplishing my research aims from my co-advisors and Scott Zeger, to mentorship on my teaching skills from Marie Diener-West and John McGready, I’m grateful that this Department has fostered such a supportive environment where I’ve been able to learn so much from so many faculty members, all of whom I hope to emulate in different ways as I advance in my career.

What do you enjoy most about Baltimore? 

While I appreciate many aspects of Baltimore, I enjoy the city’s eclectic mix of modern innovations and traditions the most. Since 2014, Mr. Trash Wheel and the three other trash interceptors in his family have provided clever and humorous ways to remove pollutants from the waters around Baltimore Harbor, increase awareness about environmental stewardship, and release open data that can inform waste reduction legislation. Also, the annual Baltimore Kinetic Sculpture Race and Hampdenfest events are quirky and fun, and they further show how passionate many Baltimoreans are about serving their local community.

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