My advanced GIS portfolio
My name is Oscar Medina. I am a second-year graduate student at CMU, studying management and public policy. I am originally from San Diego, CA. Before coming to CMU, I worked in transportation planning. For my first job out of school, I worked at a planning firm specializing in the community engagement component of planning efforts. After a year, I left to join a non-profit pedestrian, bicycle, and public transit advocacy organization. The non-profit had a consulting model. A large part of the organization functioned as a planning firm. They would bid on projects, and the revenue from the planning work would fund the advocacy. Before starting my studies, I worked at an environmental justice organization where I did a lot of direct advocacy at the metropolitan planning organization and regional transit agency levels.
While my background is firmly centered on transportation, I’ve taken a more substantial interest in economic development since moving to Pittsburgh. I pivoted my focus because it feels like more exciting things are happening locally around economic development than transportation. I hope to take the skills I learn at Heinz to start a new chapter of my career in the economic development space.
There are two things I would like to get out of this course. First, I want to learn new techniques that will help me visualize data. GIS is expansive, and there is so much to learn that you dont know you can do something until you are exposed to it. I want to be exposed to a lot of new things!
Second, I want to take my skills to the next level, from being capable of performing certain types of analysis to professionally presenting those findings. I want to be able to show my work publicly or to clients.