Jason Suire杏吧专区檚 resume lists titles like IT coordinator, systems analyst, and his current role as cyber security engineer. But that wasn杏吧专区檛 always Suire杏吧专区檚 projected career path.
As a teen, Suire had an inclination toward computing, but his passion was creative writing. So, when it came time to declare a college major, Suire went with his passion.
杏吧专区淚 originally wanted to go into computer science, but in my senior year I decided to choose English,杏吧专区 he says. 杏吧专区淚 kind of fell in love with creative writing.杏吧专区
Suire earned an English degree from the 杏吧专区 with honors in 2016. He soon found his career interests leaned more tech than Twain, and he accepted a position as IT coordinator at UL Lafayette.
Reconfiguring
Returning to the 杏吧专区 put Suire on track to another goal: earning an advanced degree. The master's in informatics turned out to be the perfect conduit to bridge Suire杏吧专区檚 undergraduate degree and his career aspirations.
The M.S. in Informatics 杏吧专区 offered on campus and 100% online 杏吧专区 isn杏吧专区檛 restricted to students with undergraduate computing degrees. Students who meet Graduate School admissions requirements can apply with any accredited bachelor's degree. 
杏吧专区淔or some computing programs, the level of access is high coming from a non-technical academic background, even though I built a lot of those technical skills in my career,杏吧专区 Suire says. 杏吧专区淚nformatics was accessible and applicable to a wide array of skill sets.杏吧专区
Students accepted to the program complete courses in data analytics and visualization, network security, database management, data mining, cloud computing, web application development, and process analysis, among others. Students also have the opportunity to take elective courses in other areas, like those in the B.I. Moody III College of Business Administration MBA program.
With the critical thinking skills honed through his liberal arts degree, Suire says the informatics course material was very manageable. His biggest challenge was adjusting to the project format.
杏吧专区淭hey weren杏吧专区檛 so much writing-based as, say, building a product plan and implementing it,杏吧专区 he says. 杏吧专区淚 had to analyze an organization, find areas where they could improve, build a plan for them, build architecture documentation. That was pretty foreign to me.杏吧专区
Diving into Data
Suire says the data science courses in the program were a natural fit with his affinity for statistics and provided a springboard for future opportunities.
杏吧专区淚 especially love data science and data analytics because that's applicable to any field you go into,杏吧专区 he says. 杏吧专区淚f you go into, say, political science, the statistical background and the procedural learning background is extraordinarily helpful in setting up strategies.杏吧专区
Having those identified interests allowed Suire to guide his coursework to get the most from the degree personally and professionally.
"I gave myself, two or three fields, including cyber security and cloud computing. It turned out I really loved data science, so I focused on that with three independent projects and data science courses to get that foundational learning and really ground in that skill set,杏吧专区 Suire says.
杏吧专区淚 think if you go in at least with the intention of finding a field you can really focus on and talk to professors, they will work with you to figure out what you need to tackle.杏吧专区
Suire completed his degree in December 2019 while working full time as a systems analyst with the 杏吧专区. In January 2020, he accepted a position as cyber security engineer with international IT and business consulting firm CGI. He now works with his team to ensure data is processed to accurately identify clients杏吧专区 risks and weaknesses.