Skip to main content

An Update on My Journey from Algebra Teacher to Power BI

Time for an update on my journey. We last left off in March with the following
words: “I am still nowhere near mastering this program.  As an educator I know
that repetition, studying, taking detailed notes, and not being afraid to ask for
help is what turns a student into being a success. I plan on doing all of those
things on my journey to learning Power BI and the other programs I will be
tasked with teaching.

I wanted to share my process of transitioning from an Algebra teacher to a
trainer with you in hopes that if there is anyone else out there who is
apprehensive about the new technology you are learning for your job or you are
considering making a change in your career,  or if you are just feeling
overwhelmed with whatever the task may be - you can stop by from time to
time for some motivation and quick tips."

March has turned into May and I have taken myriad courses covering Power BI. 

Did I retain every single detail and master the program? No, of course not. The Power
BI program is always changing, new and unique challenges are always presenting
themselves, and there is no limit to how advanced you can get with the program.

Do I feel more comfortable with program? Yes, by taking detailed notes,
reviewing them, working with sample data sets, and not giving up on the process- I
can say I feel so much more confident in my abilities than I did back in March.

Was it hard work? Of course. Were there days where I wanted to just say my
brain can’t soak up any more information? You better believe it. Can advanced
DAX really make you go crazy? That again is an affirmative. The thing is though
that I am committed to this process and get more and more comfortable in my
new role each day.

With each new training session I deliver to others,  I am able to start answering
more advanced questions. I am starting to hone my craft of how best to make
sense to others this world of Power BI. I have learned so many tricks and tips
from my colleagues along the way and I am excited for the next few months to
continue teaching, gain more confidence, and help you along the way with easy to
understand tutorials and videos.

It’s a journey that can be overwhelming so I hope that some of the material on
this site can help you along the way.

Comments

  1. Great article with very unique content.
    Thank you for sharing it..

    Keep Updating...

    Power BI Online Training India

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Power of CALCULATE in Power BI

Last week in my blog and video I discussed how Power BI could have made my life as a teacher much easier.  It is not that Power BI can do things that I could not on my own.  It is the fact that Power BI could have saved me so much time.   This led me to some thoughts and questions.   How could I have impacted the students more in the classroom with this extra time?  Would teachers who were not analyzing student data due to time constraints now start?  How can I make the data tell my students a story that gives them an accurate picture of their progress?   That last question is what leads to this week’s blog.   Many times the metrics (which is just a fancy word for "numbers") of what we want to show are easy to do by hand with a basic math background.  Although easy, it can be very time consuming when dealing with different groups of data: like 6 periods of students instead of 1 period. When we want to do these calculations quickl...

Relating "Related Tables" to Baseball because I Miss Sports

I miss sports. In particular, I miss baseball. Between learning more Power BI functions and the ins-and-outs of DAX, I've turned to Netflix to fill the deep caverns left in my soul since baseball season has been postponed. And as a result, I've thought more about tigers and big cats more than I ever have in my life. I know ALL about Carol Baskins and am fully on board for a spin-off centering on locating her lost husband. I've googled "is it really legal to own a tiger in a residential area?" Without baseball in April, I am barely hanging in there (kinda like Joe Exotic's eyebrow ring). So, I am filling the sports-sized hole by using baseball stats in Power BI to demonstrate pulling data from multiple tables and consolidating it into one table.  Some of the data we want to consolidate also has to have some aggregations (which is fancy for "calculations") performed on it.  In this demo I will attempt to break down what is really going on ...

The Teacher Becomes the Student

My wife asked how my first day was going so I sent her this selfie. Only a picture could capture it.  First, let me tell you that this won’t be your typical Power BI or tech blog that you usually see. Let me set the scene. It was a year and a half ago when I got lucky enough to be introduced to Brian Knight, the CEO of Pragmatic Works over lunch. He had heard from a mutual friend that I was looking to make a career move after teaching Algebra for the past 15 years. Brian started telling me about the company and all the different facets it encompasses. From training, sales, consulting, and app development. Mind you at this time I had never heard of Microsoft Power BI, SQL Server, Microsoft Azure, or have any experience with coding. He told me an opportunity at his company may present itself in the future where I could transfer over my teaching skills into the training side of the above-mentioned programs. I immediately got to work with their On-Demand Learning system to ...