Alumni Profile: Zana English, Data and Policy Summer Scholars Program’24

Zana English, DPSS’24, became fascinated with data and public policy while earning her BA in political science for the University of Arkansas. “I come from a family of scientists and educators, so numbers and data have always been a part of my life. But, when I got to college, I fell in love with the world of politics. Even though I had a lot of anxiety around math, I wanted to do political research."

Studying polling data in one of her classes, English said, was the data experience that got her hooked. "We worked with polling numbers and wrote articles and essays about how the election would turn out from data collected from people on the ground, and my analysis was the only one that concluded Trump would win the 2016 election.”

English originally planned to attend law school after completing her undergraduate work, but instead participated in Teach for America (TFA), where her love for analytics truly blossomed. "Although I was teaching biology, I used data to show my students their academic growth.”

TFA, English said, also introduced her to coding. “I started an after-school program focusing on science, but once a week we had a coding hour because my students showed interest in it….and that’s where I discovered the desire to learn how to code.”

However, she added, the biggest impact TFA had on her was from two fellow TFA teachers. "Chasity Williams really helped me get more comfortable with math, which really helped set me on my career path, and Marvin Espinoza-Leiva mentored me in math and data analytics."

English subsequently applied her data, coding, and math skills at 100Devs, a tech and coding company. “I became a better data analyst at 100Devs, but I still wanted to strengthen my data analysis skills—and explore the ethical implications of data use in public policy.”

This desire led her to the Data and Policy Summer Scholar (DPSS) program at the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy. “The DPSS program was a great opportunity to extend my knowledge about academic research, experience a graduate school setting, and learn R, which academics use.”

During the program, English said she gained proficiency in R, as well as a better understanding of how to incorporate data into research. “Learning how to formally code and visualize data helped me understand how to use coding languages to run tests, answer questions about data, and more efficiently run experiments that are numerically and statistically significant. These skills were valuable because my past research was more theoretical.”

DPSS also helped English think differently about using data in public policy. “One of the biggest things DPSS taught me was data’s applicability—as well as the importance of understanding the limitations of data in data analysis."

Now, in her current role as a Senior Research Associate at the American Experiment Project, English said she's applying the skills she gained from DPSS towards helping progressive content creators and influencers boost their messaging and outreach.

Eventually, English wants to learn more about how data and AI can be ethnically used in elections. "Ultimately, I'd like to be able to prevent any malicious actors from utilizing data and technology as a means to undermine democracy."