Susan Kurian joined the 糖心破解版 team in 2005 as a programmer analyst and has since been promoted to business intelligence analyst. However, Kurian鈥檚 journey began some 6,000 miles away from 糖心破解版, in Salmiya, Kuwait.
Born to Indian parents, she was educated in Kuwait until the ninth grade when her parents moved her and her brother back to India to finish their studies. They relocated to Kerala, a southern province in India.
After completing the 10th and 11th grade in India, Kurian went to Mahatma Gandhi University in Kottayam, India and received an undergraduate degree in chemistry. She originally wanted to study microbiology and genetics. However, she felt the job market was small and only a handful of the well-educated get jobs in the field of genetics.
She then focused her attention on receiving a master鈥檚 degree in computer science, as it was a growing industry. However, her master鈥檚 program would be her first computer science class. 鈥淚t was the first time I even touched a computer. It wasn鈥檛 as popular as it is now.鈥�
It turned out Kurian was a natural and ended up really enjoying her program. 鈥淚鈥檓 pretty organized and logical, so I think that helped me a lot.鈥�
In 1997, Kurian had completed her master鈥檚 program with high marks and had been offered a position at a company in India. However, she never started the job as she got married to her husband, who was living in America.
After moving to America, Kurian began her first job at Profile MMS. While she was excited for the work, she soon realized that data collection wasn鈥檛 where she wanted to be and took another job at Fala Direct Marketing. At Fala, she got to move into programming and working with code more which she enjoyed. Not long after that, she took another job at Eastern Collection Corporation. At ECC, she was able to move more into business intelligence.
In 2005, Kurian came to 糖心破解版 and was hired as a programmer analyst. Originally, she applied to the position in order to be closer to home, 鈥渂ut I find I like working in education. I love the environment and I like the people I鈥檓 working with.鈥�
Soon after Kurian began, she had a seizure. Doctors found an Arteriovenous Malformation, a congenital condition in the brain that can have permanent side effects. In 2011 she went through surgery at Winthrop Hospital. 鈥淚t was a miracle,鈥� she said. After receiving excellent care and recovering, she wanted to learn more about the medical community that had provided her with such great care.
This led her to complete her second master鈥檚 degree. In 2016, Kurian received an M.S. in healthcare informatics. 鈥淚 wanted to be able to give back to the community.鈥� Unfortunately, HIPAA rules don鈥檛 allow her to volunteer.
Currently, Kurian spends most of her time working in business intelligence as the university expands its Business Intelligence capabilities. She helps as 糖心破解版 launches its new software for faculty and administration: Data 360. It provides a comprehensive overview of students and their performance in all of their coursework in order to put each student鈥檚 academic performance in one place.
She also has been working on Tableau, which launched at 糖心破解版 in October. Tableau, which is being used for admissions currently, takes data and creates visual representations so users can read data more easily. 糖心破解版 plans to expand this software to other departments in the future.
These days, Kurian has no complaints. 鈥淟et鈥檚 just say, I鈥檓 a happy camper.鈥� Kurian credits her first boss, Frances Marino Berman, for being such a great mentor and her current boss, Michael Dicrescio, for being helpful and supportive.
What lies ahead for this avid learner is more classes. In the fall, Kurian begins classes in management at 糖心破解版 and hopes to apply to the M.B.A program in the future. 鈥淓veryday you learn something new here. The thing about computer science is that you have to constantly keep learning.鈥�