Allison Wong

“I think SAAS became closer with each other and friendly. People are a lot more involved now than when I first joined. I felt people were still super close knit and involved but I think it's just gotten more so. Yeah, just the people who joined are more active now.”

Where are you from and what are you majoring in?

I'm a third-year data science major from the Bay Area.

Why did you choose to do data science?

In high school, I thought statistics was really cool, but I also wanted to apply it more. I feel like data science is a good way to combine [statistics and computing].

What do you do for fun?

I enjoy swimming even though I haven't gone for like a year, but that was one of my major hobbies. I also like doing arts and crafts–during quarantine I made a bunch of friendship bracelets, but I haven't really been doing that since I didn't bring my stuff to Berkeley. Lately I've been trying to make new cooking dishes, but I wouldn't call myself a chef or anything.

What have you been making?

I tried making pasta with olive oil and butter sauce, quesadillas, stir-fried vegetables, and other simple stuff. I’m trying to work up to more advanced items, but still keeping it manageable.

What are you trying to work up to?

Cooking chicken. I try to avoid making meat because it's kind of scary to make sure it's cooked enough. It's pretty easy to make pasta and vegetables because they're pretty safe foods, but meats are a little more complicated.

What classes are you taking right now? And are you doing other stuff on campus besides SAAS?

I'm taking CS186, which is about database systems, STAT135, and Data 144, which is data mining. On campus, I'm doing a data discovery project about mapping technological resources for the elderly and disabled adults. So it's not just a map of the resources existing, but also a map of demographics of the area. We haven't really gotten too much into it because it just started, and we're still gathering data and trying to find a way to represent that data.

How did you find out about SAAS?

I found out about SAAS through Jackie–she made a Facebook post about it and I knew her from before. I mean, I'd heard of SAAS before, but I wasn't sure about applying because I didn't really know much about it. Then I went to the info session and it seemed pretty cool, so that's how I found out about SAAS.

When did you join us and what committees were you in previously?

I joined CX in Fall 2020, and then I joined Web Dev in Spring 2021. Now, I’m a Web Dev co-director.

What did you like about each of the committees that you were in?

For Career Exploration, I liked that we could learn a lot. Also just meet a lot of experienced people as well. You get introduced to a lot of people of varying levels. I liked that you could get to know people who've gone through the data science and statistics world and learn from them. Also be involved in something yourself in the club. And then I guess, about web dev I guess it was cool to be able to learn skills that you might not learn in your classes, have practice on doing independent work, so that was cool, too.

What made you decide to keep staying in SAAS?

Definitely, the community of people, they've been really welcoming. I just wanted a chance to keep in touch with them and still hang out with them. And it will be hard to keep up if you're not in SAAS anymore.

How did you make friends in SAAS?

I think I made some friends through committees just because we had to work together a lot. And also, Big/Little, like my Big had two littles. So, I became friends with the other little and we joined CX together, so we kind of just keep in touch and then I think donutbot is a good way to make friends because it's kind of more personal and you don't have to keep up with socializing with a bunch of people at once. You're kind of just like with a couple or one or two people so you really get to get personal and know them. So I've become pretty good friends with the people I've had donutbots with.

Has SAAS changed during the time you've been in it?

I think SAAS became closer with each other and friendly. People are a lot more involved now than when I first joined. I felt people were still super close knit and involved but I think it's just gotten more so. Yeah, just the people who joined are more active now.

Do you have any advice for new SAAS members?

I definitely think try to meet people outside your committee, because you can, because it's fun. Also, put in the work toward your committee too. Because what you put in, you get back. So I guess [doing the] work in your committee is important. And you'll be rewarded for that. Also, it's always good to take advantage of the many ways to meet people because you just have fun and get a bigger community.

Do you have a favorite class that you've taken or want to take?

I think [CS] 61B was pretty cool because you just learn a lot and you can think I feel like it helped me grow a lot because in the end there was a pretty big project and it was cool. I also liked Data 100 because you can just learn a lot about how data science works and yet like it's a practice on some pretty cool data and do different things with it. So I like that too.

What’s your favorite spot on campus that you like going to?

I like hanging out at Doe to study. It looks really cool inside and you can see all the students at the same time doing the same thing. So that's pretty cool. I just like the way it looks.

Prettiest and ugliest building on campus?

Ugliest, I would say Evans. Just the stairs confuses me and the elevators also confuses me. It's not just the outward look, but also the inside. And also the lack of Windows. Prettiest, Doe is nice on the inside. That's where I tend to go.