Month: April 2024

Evitt Nashed

Dr. Smith

April 4^th, 2024

        To start this paper, what does data mean to us? In my own words, I would describe data as a set of numbers and stats that can give us context to evaluate. Data analysis can be described as looking at a set of data and examining it. I decided to examine and analyze housing data sets.

      I picked one specifically for Crimes in the St Louis area, especially the neighborhoods. The department that oversees Crimes and publishes them in records would be the Police Department. Some sources that this data set provides would be the Bureau of Justice Statistics, individual crimes published each Month of each year. The police department created these data files to help others be aware of the individual crimes happening in St Louis City. We can use these data sets to better these crimes and to lessen them in the city. These data sets can also be used to see what these numbers mean and how they compare to the past years.

   Looking at the data itself is constructed into columns of the crimes itself, the NIBRS, the years 2023 and 2024 comparing them, the change if there is any, and lastly the YTD. The organization of this data is very set and structured so it is easy to understand. It can be used to publish a line or bar graph of the increase and decrease of specific crimes in St Louis.

    Cleaning Data can have positive and negative impacts on data sets. The positive impact cleaning data can have would be that it can help you make sure there’s no inaccurate information that can be misused. The negative impact cleaning data can cause would be that it is tweaking the “raw data.” Raw data is beneficial since you can make up anything from that and work on it. Cleaning data was used by the Police Department so the public could have accurate and updated information about crimes in St Louis.

    While looking over these data sets, I was considering what the Police department’s goal was for publishing this data. I feel as if they made these data sets for the public to be aware of the increase or decrease of crimes happening in their nearby neighborhoods. They also published this because it can show how the Police in St Louis are helping in committing crimes. The department wanted to publish every year of crimes from 2021 to 2024 for the public to see the different amounts of crimes that were committed by civilians.

   The way I would use this data to examine would be copying and pasting the data records and making it into a bar graph to see the increase and decrease of the crimes throughout the years. This data can help surrounding neighborhoods be aware of the crimes that are happening within their community. They could make a change in their community and help in making these crimes decrease. The community has to work together to flourish peacefully and have fewer crimes.

Evitt Nashed

April 10th, 2024

Our Final Lab for Codes 122 was a conducted survey that was sent out to the public and MOBOT researchers to get a more thorough understanding of our wicked problem. My group’s survey was about the lack of knowledge within the MOBOT about indigenous knowledge. We decided to ask a series of questions in our survey about indigenous knowledge in the MOBOT and what we would get as a result to help us resolve this wicked problem. We only got 7 responses to our survey, which was less than we thought but was better than nothing! The people who participated in our survey ranged from research and department leaders, to graduate students, scientists, and even librarians.

        One of our questions was, “What does indigenous knowledge mean to you?” A couple of people responded with traditional and environmental knowledge used for their benefit. Another answer we got was Any specialized environmental knowledge from a local group. They also gave us examples like Indigenous folks, organic gardeners, and craftworkers. We also had two responses about Robin Wall Kimmerer’s work and book about correlations of “native” and “Western” taxonomies: even Sacajawea’s role in the Lewis and Clark Voyage of Discovery.

     Another question in our survey was how we can implement indigenous knowledge into the gardens. We got good answers about implementing research they conducted in the Madagascar Program. Another way we can incorporate indigenous knowledge is through exhibits, and also continuing to incorporate this into Western scientific research from the garden. Mostly, all researchers claimed that indigenous knowledge should be implemented everywhere in the MOBOT.

   One of our last questions was about how indigenous knowledge should be showcased. These survey takers thought that museum exhibits and signs in the garden were good examples of showcasing indigenous knowledge. Other examples could be tours or guest speakers talking about the use of indigenous knowledge. A linkage I found within all these answers for this specific question is that all of them preferred signage as a good way to spread the word about indigenous knowledge. Signage is the design or use of signs to get a message to the public.

   This survey overall helped us fill in the gaps and missing pieces of what we wanted to know about indigenous knowledge. Our surveys also helped to raise awareness about indigenous knowledge and why it should be implemented in the Gardens. Indigenous knowledge can give us insights into how these certain people lived and survived with only their natural resources. We can use this information to make MOBOT a less Westernized facility.

    Even though we got good responses to our survey, MOBOT still has qualitative challenges and problems that are hard to fix.  Libraries, databases, and archives can be one example of a challenge the garden faces where the knowledge is broad, but not deep. Another challenge is that it is difficult to get more detailed information from indigenous communities because meaningful and sustained community connections take much time to receive. Many indigenous people do not have the communication resources we have so it takes a good amount of time to get good information.