Looking at Numbers and Telling a Story

Although I’ve had experience with doing research before, research projects are still always a pain.  I did not know where to start except that I had a certain immigrant group to work with and a couple of sources to sift through.  There seemed to be an endless possibility of things I could talk about, but only so few pages to do it in.  When I finally managed to get some of it done, it did not get any easier.  Gathering and organizing the data is hard enough already, but I had to further analyze the data and figure out the connections with other course materials.  I was able to find all the numbers I needed, but I had to dig deep and figure what story these numbers were telling me.  When I look back at the work I have completed, I was partly relieved that I had finished it, but I was also proud that I had actually been able to prove a point in my paper.  Through the statistical profile assignment, I learned more about the largest immigrant group in the United States and a fast growing immigrant group in New York City, the Mexicans.  As with many of the other assignments in this class, I gained an appreciation for how unique New York City actually is compared to the rest of the United States.