Data Analyst — Pretender

Missions

1. Clean the survey table

   The fictional Vale Novo School asked students how they get to school. Before anyone makes a chart, you check the table for mistakes.

   Spot the issues · ~4 min

2. An honest chart

   The clean survey shows: walk 40%, bus 30%, bike 20%, car 10%. The school council wants a chart for the hallway, and one member wants the bike number to 'look bigger'.

   Decisions · ~4 min

3. What does the data really say?

   Fictional data from Vale Novo: students who eat breakfast scored a bit higher in a maths quiz. People are already drawing conclusions. Which ones are fair?

   Sort into groups · ~3 min

4. The average that lied

   A fictional school survey asked students to rate lunch from 1 to 5. Some left the answer blank (stored as null). The current code says the average is 2.1 — suspiciously low. Fix it.

   Code checks · ~4 min

5. Do more students cycle?

   A fictional town built a bike lane to the school. The council asks: did more students start cycling? Order the steps of your analysis.

   Put in order · ~3 min

6. One paragraph for the mayor

   Your fictional analysis found that bikes parked at the school rose from about 40 to about 70 a day after the new bike lane. Survey data came from only one school. The mayor has 30 seconds to read your summary.

   Write a message · ~3 min

What they do

Data analysts help teams answer questions with data. They clean messy tables, look for patterns, choose fair charts, check whether a pattern is real or just chance, and explain what the numbers do and don't say.

Skills

• Logical thinking — Following steps and rules precisely.
• Clear explaining — Making ideas easy to understand.
• Fairness — Applying rules the same way for everyone.

Typical tasks

• Clean a messy spreadsheet
• Choose the right chart
• Explain results to non-experts

Tools

• Spreadsheets
• Charts and dashboards
• Query languages

Responsibilities

• Protect personal data
• Never bend numbers to please someone

Myth or reality?

Myth: Numbers never lie.
Reality: Numbers can mislead through a bad chart, a tiny sample or missing data.

Myth: It's all maths, no people.
Reality: The hardest part is asking the right question and explaining the answer to people.

Explore next

• Software Developer — Build the apps and tools people use every day.
• Journalist & Fact-checker — Find the facts, check them and tell the story fairly.
• Lab Scientist — Ask questions and test them with fair experiments.

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• Statistician
• Data scientist
• Market researcher

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