Throughout the duration of this course, I learned several different skills and conquered tasks that I never would have imagined doing as a Criminal Justice major. Probably the most important aspect was by being able to look at statistics and projects differently. With this skill, I was able to adjust to a larger quotient of ideas and tasks in order to complete and understand the numbers and statistics that we have provided throughout the semester. Another thing that we learned throughout the semester was learning how to work RStudio and SPSS. By being able to work out these two programs, we were able to get a much more in-depth detail answer and statistic regarding our research. When I first saw RStudio and SPSS, I was extremely lost and had no idea why we had to learn this in the first place since I was a Criminal Justice major but throughout time it taught me more than I can even recall. It taught me how to not only analyze data in different forms such as ANOVA, Chi-squared, T-test, and Regression models; but it also taught me how to recode variables for both of these programs and how to properly read and understand them in not only a researcher point of view but also in a reader’s view.
All of the items above matter in a larger context due to multiple factors with the one primarily being understood from two points of view. When you look at it from a researcher’s standpoint, you learn to view it in the vocabulary that you have learned throughout the semester but also by looking at the statistics in a way that will help you uncover the hypotheses you created early on. What I mean by this is that when I created my hypothesis that child engagement and family household income had a relationship together dictating whether or not that higher income households were less involved than lower income households, I was able to look at tests from ANOVA and Chi-squared to be able to determine whether or not this is true. For instance, the results from my ANOVA and Chi-squared tests showed that there was no significant relationship between my two variables but when we looked at my T-test it showed there was, this made me question whether or not that they do have a relationship due to the fact that even though multiple tests came out to no significance, that ONE test can change everything so it just makes you think. Now when you read this data from a viewer’s point of view, you have to elaborate it enough to be able to explain the terms and graphs that are being shown so they can also understand where I am coming from.
My goal with what I have learned in this course is to carry out a larger span of experimenting through a different idea. What I want to accomplish is prioritize the mental health for children ages twelve through sixteen for small counties such as where I am from and being able to expand on the mental health knowledge and helping facilities that are present in these areas. Through this, I want to send out a survey to the middle schools and high schools that are in not only my county but surrounding counties to help determine mental health problems but also accessibilities that these children may have and what schools and parents can do to help them out when they are not only at school, but at homes as well. With doing this, I can put the information into an excel sheet and figure out two variables that I put into the survey and analyze different aspects such as household income and mental health availability and see how the two relationships respond to together if there is any significance to them at all.
If I do not decide to build another experiment off of this idea, I do want to write a paper regarding crime rates in lower economic standing cities compared to high economic standings and see what the relationships have in common and what they have that is different. By accomplishing this, it would not only help out my resume in writing an efficient research paper but also by showing that if I care about a particular problem with our world I can find ways to help and improve it even if it is small pieces at a time. As an overall of this class, I am extremely thankful for how this project not only turned out but by also seeing the dedication from other students and from the professor. These people were there for me when I was struggling and helped me in ways that I will forever be in their debt for. The one person that never gave up on me was my professor. Without having the help and patience from her, I do not know where I would be. Throughout all the difficult and good times, I never once saw her come into class without a smile or without talking to the students regarding our days and if we needed help with anything.