Reason 157

Data. There is no denying that data is sexy. No, I'm not referring to Data from The Goonies (although all of his gadgets were pretty hot), but rather groups of numbers that can be poured over and manipulated in order to paint a clearer picture of something. In college I majored in Sociology, mostly because it was the only subject that I thought I could stomach for four years, and one of the unexpected joys of studying how groups of people around the world interact was the program's emphasis on research and data as a way of understanding human craziness. Sophomore year I signed up, kicking and screaming, for a required statistics class and was shocked to discover the work was interesting and I actually had a knack for calculating probabilities and creating oddly shaped graphs. Fast forward seven years later to me being hired as a teacher who, as it turns out, needs to constantly evaluate data about students in order to understand which concepts they are struggling with and which information thay have a solid grasp on so we can, as a class, move on into new territory. Every year students across the state take a standardized assessment of their reading skills and when the results arrive a few months later I practically bathe in all those scores, cackling with delight as I create spreadsheet after spreadsheet of information that will be critical in shaping the next year's classroom experience. Jason, I have no idea if you geek out about data, too, but if you do I will always be ready and willing to discuss the latest box office draws or most recent research around employing acting techniques peddled by Strasberg versus Stanislavsky. And, if you aren't too keen on numerical measurements, I will happily preach the gospel of data in an attempt to bring you over to the dark side. Really, anyway you slice it I come out a mathematical winner.