I want to write.
I want to tell my story, help others, create knowledge, learn, grow, and everything else that one can do. I want to do it all - and writing is necessary for this. Therefore, I want to write.
The advice I have always been given (or, more accurately, have read) is to just write. Write anything that you want, but just keep writing and do so regularly. I'm not even going to find attributions for this because I think it may even be common knowledge by this point. Another bit of common advice is to know one's audience. (Kurt Vonnegut gives some advice for writing short stories, and many other authors have spoken or written on the subject.)
Well, who exactly is my audience? This website is a blog - my blog - and I write whatever I want. The name at the top isn't a cutesy title derived from a statistics or education term; it is my name. My audience is me. I'm writing to myself because I want to remember this time in my life. I want to remember the joy and pain, the triumphs and defeats of doctoral school (hopefully heavier on the joy/triumph than pain/defeat).
But I'm not solipsistic. I also have a 'real' audience in mind. It is fragmented, but it is still my intended reader. The groups I imagine comprising my audience are:
- Graduate students (or soon-to-be graduate students) - We will undoubtedly share many similar experiences, and camaraderie (even if virtual) is a Good Thing.
- Anyone at UF - I sometimes post things that are related to Gainesville and UF, and these might be good resources for anyone involved with UF (undergrads, grads, staff, faculty, etc.).
- People interested in statistics education - Statistics education is what I'm studying, and I'll be posting things related to it pretty much for as long as this blog is around. This includes both researchers and teachers of statistics. Hopefully this audience will grow over time.
- People interested in statistics/data - I attended statistics graduate school for two years because I love statistics - I just happen to love the educational aspects of it more. I still love data, graphs, R, analysis, visualization, etc. and will post on these things from time to time.
- People searching the web for individual examples of statistical things - I get a good number of hits from people searching for misleading graphs in the news, and I'll try to keep posting things that people are looking for. This is an audience that I wasn't intending to have, but will try to be a good steward of.
- People searching the web for specific computer issues - I know how frustrating it is when hardware or software goes awry, so whenever I have issues (or find what I consider a particularly good solution for a problem/task) I'll post it. The more quality explanations for problems the better.
So that's who I'm writing to. If you are a member of one of the above groups, what would you like to see more of? If you are not, do you still view yourself as my audience? Respond in the comments and we'll get a dialogue going!