My personal career planning revolves around strategically leveraging my diverse experiences in industrial processes, business model valuation, programming, and quantitative analysis. The goal is to forge a unique professional path that integrates my passion for finance and education, while continually refining my English proficiency to a native speaker level.
My plan begins with deep specialization in quantitative finance, applying my programming skills to complex financial modeling and data analysis. This will involve pursuing certifications like the CFA, as noted in my PLN. Simultaneously, I aim to translate my industrial process optimization background into practical applications within financial operations or educational technology, seeking roles where efficiency and innovation intersect.
Furthermore, my career trajectory will heavily incorporate my interest in education. I envision contributing to financial literacy initiatives or developing instructional materials that demystify complex financial concepts for diverse audiences, particularly those in multicultural business environments. This dual focus on technical mastery and effective knowledge dissemination will define my long-term professional identity, aiming for a leadership role where I can bridge analytical rigor with impactful communication and learning design.
Creating a robust Personal Learning Network (PLN) is an invaluable strategy for long-term growth. For my interests, I especially aim to improve my English to a native speaker level and become professional in finance and education. A PLN is essentially a self-curated ecosystem of people, resources, and tools that supports a personal continuous learning journey. It moves beyond formal education, fostering self-directed and adaptable knowledge acquisition.
To build my PLN, I will begin by identifying key sources in each domain. For English, subscribing to podcasts or YouTube channels focused on advanced grammar and pronunciation is very helpful. In finance, I will follow reputable analysts, financial news outlets, and engage in forums like r/CFAlevel3 for specific insights. For education, I will seek out thought leaders in pedagogy, instructional design, and digital literacy. I will leverage tools like RSS feeds for curated news, note-taking apps for synthesizing information, and social media platforms, such as LinkedIn and Reddit, to connect with experts and peers. I will regularly review and refine my network, ensuring it remains relevant and challenging, providing a dynamic foundation for my ongoing intellectual development.
I have seen some interesting short videos on social media this week. They used published cartoons with new stories and narrations created by produsers. Some of them are very creative, but I think there are some issues should be concerned.
The phenomenon of "second time creation" on social media, particularly in short video formats, involves creators repurposing existing copyrighted content, such as popular cartoon characters or movie clips, and infusing them with new narrations, stories, or comedic twists. This trend thrives on the immediate recognition and emotional connection audiences already have with established intellectual property. Creators leverage this familiarity to rapidly generate engaging content, often showcasing impressive creative ingenuity in writing new dialogues or crafting novel scenarios for beloved characters. It fosters a vibrant fan culture, allowing communities to extend and interact with their favorite franchises in imaginative ways.
However, this widespread practice exists in a legally ambiguous space. While these "second time creations" undeniably add new, original elements, they fundamentally rely on pre-existing copyrighted material. Under intellectual property law, such adaptations are typically classified as "derivative works," requiring explicit permission from the original copyright holder. Creators often operate under the assumption of "fair use" or "fair dealing," arguing their work is transformative, critical, or parodic. Yet, the legal interpretation of these defenses is complex and highly context-dependent. This creates a constant tension between the desire for creative expression and community engagement on one hand, and the rights of original content owners to control their intellectual property on the other.
I have learned a lot of new skills and found a great deal of inspiration in recent studies. Based on my experiences in industrial processes, business model valuation, improvements in programming skills, and my quantitative sense, it's proving complicated to arrange my webpage in a concise way.
Here's a plan for it:
Phase 1: Define Core Message & Audience
Identify my "Brand": What is the single most important message you want visitors to take away? Is it your analytical prowess, your ability to bridge business and tech, or your innovative problem-solving? This will be your guiding principle for conciseness.
Target Audience: Who am I trying to reach (recruiters, collaborators, clients)? Tailor my content to their interests.
Key Sections: Outline essential sections (e.g., About Me, Projects, Skills, Contact). For "Projects," select only 3-5 most impactful ones that showcase your diverse abilities.
Phase 2: Content Curation & Structuring
Concise Narratives: For each project, write a brief, impactful summary (2-3 sentences) highlighting the problem, your role, and the quantifiable outcome. Use bullet points for key achievements.
Skill Showcase: Categorize my skills (e.g., "Quantitative Analysis," "Process Optimization," "Programming Languages"). Use concise lists or even a small, simple chart to visualize proficiency.
Visuals First: Plan for compelling, clean visuals (e.g., project screenshots, simple diagrams, a professional headshot) that communicate quickly. Leverage my "aesthetic" sense.
Information Hierarchy: Think about the "golden ratio" principle. What's the most important information? Place it prominently.
Phase 3: Technical Implementation & Refinement
R-based Framework: Utilize blogdown or distill with R Markdown. This allows you to embed code and analysis directly, showcasing your programming skills inherently.
Minimalist Design: Choose a clean, uncluttered theme. Embrace white space to reduce cognitive load, as you noted in your presentation evaluation.
Iterative Review: Regularly review my content for conciseness. Can a sentence be a phrase? Can a paragraph be bullet points? Get feedback from others on clarity and impact.
Deployment Plan: Prepare for hosting on GitHub Pages or Netlify.
By focusing on a clear message, curating impactful content, and leveraging R's capabilities with a minimalist design philosophy, I can create a powerful and concise personal webpage.
Evaluating commercial processes often relies on quantifiable metrics like cost-benefit analysis, profit margins, and return on investment. Businesses can directly calculate efficiency, revenue, and market share, allowing for clear, often short-term, financial valuations. The goal is typically to optimize for immediate economic gains, making performance measurement straightforward and tied to tangible monetary figures.
Education, however, presents a far more nuanced and complex evaluation challenge. Its impact extends well beyond immediate financial returns, encompassing personal growth, critical thinking, civic engagement, and long-term societal benefits. While direct costs can be calculated, the "profit" of education is not easily monetized. The effects of learning can be prolonged over a lifetime, influencing career trajectories, personal well-being, and contributing to family and community prosperity for decades. Assessing this requires qualitative measures, longitudinal studies, and an understanding that true educational value often manifests in intangible ways, making a direct numerical comparison to commercial valuation inadequate. It's an investment in human capital with returns that are profound but not always immediately measurable in monetary terms.
In the Web 2.0 era, social media has become a powerful conduit for information dissemination, allowing individuals to become opinion leaders and activists. The value of evaluating information from these platforms lies in harnessing this rapid, widespread communication for informed decision-making and learning. Social media offers real-time updates, diverse perspectives, and direct access to primary sources, fostering a more democratic information landscape. For learners, it can provide current events, varied viewpoints, and opportunities for informal, community-driven education. Effectively evaluating this information allows users to tap into collective intelligence and identify emerging trends.
However, this decentralized nature presents significant challenges. The sheer volume of content makes information overload a constant threat. Crucially, social media is rife with misinformation and disinformation, often amplified by algorithms and echo chambers. Distinguishing between credible sources and biased, unverified, or emotionally manipulative content requires sophisticated digital literacy skills. The lack of traditional editorial oversight, coupled with the speed of sharing, means false narratives can spread rapidly. Furthermore, personal biases and the formation of "filter bubbles" can limit exposure to diverse viewpoints, hindering a balanced understanding. Therefore, critical evaluation is paramount to leverage social media's value while mitigating its inherent risks.
Creating a personal webpage is increasingly vital in today's social media-driven world. It serves as a professional hub, a curated portfolio, and a dynamic resume, allowing you to showcase your skills, projects, and insights beyond the fleeting nature of social media feeds. Unlike scattered posts, a personal webpage offers a centralized, controlled space to present your expertise, establish your online presence, and connect with a broader audience—be it potential employers, collaborators, or fellow enthusiasts. It demonstrates digital literacy and a proactive approach to personal branding, crucial in an era where online visibility often translates to opportunity.
Next week, my main procedures for this task using the R programming language will involve several key steps. First, I'll choose a suitable R package for web development, likely blogdown or distill, which integrate seamlessly with R Markdown for content creation. This will involve setting up the project environment and selecting a theme. Second, I'll focus on content generation, writing about my projects, skills, and learning experiences in R Markdown files. This allows for easy embedding of R code, plots, and interactive elements. Finally, I'll handle the deployment, using services like Netlify or GitHub Pages to publish the static site generated by R, making my personal webpage accessible to the world.
Creating engaging video and cartoon content has become incredibly accessible and powerful with the tools available today. Gone are the days when high-quality video production required extensive technical expertise and expensive equipment. Now, platforms like PowerPoint are no longer just for static slides; they can be dynamic animation and video creation hubs. When combined with audio tools like Audacity, you can record and refine crisp narration, or even leverage AI Text-to-Speech services like Murf to generate professional voiceovers from your scripts, saving immense time and effort.
For video editing, user-friendly software such as iMovie allows you to seamlessly stitch together clips, add transitions, and incorporate your AI-generated audio and visuals. Beyond these, the rise of AI image generators (like those we discussed for cartoon avatars) means you can design unique characters and scenes with simple text prompts. This synergy of traditional software and cutting-edge AI empowers creators to produce compelling instructional videos and animated content, making complex topics more digestible and visually appealing for a global audience on platforms like YouTube.
In online learning communities, the instructor's role is absolutely pivotal, extending far beyond merely delivering content. They serve as crucial facilitators, mentors, and community builders, transforming passive information consumption into active, meaningful learning. A skilled instructor curates reliable resources, structures discussions, and guides learners toward deeper understanding, ensuring content relevance and quality. They provide essential feedback, clarify complex concepts, and personalize the learning experience, fostering a supportive and engaging environment that motivates participation and encourages critical thinking. This guidance is vital for navigating the vast, often unfiltered, online information space. Without effective instruction, online communities risk becoming mere information repositories, lacking the direction necessary for meaningful skill acquisition and knowledge retention.
Online learning communities, while offering immense potential, also present unique challenges that instructors must address. Learners often struggle with navigating unfiltered information, needing guidance to identify reliable resources amidst overwhelming content. For Chinese learners, language barriers can hinder active participation in discussions, and platform-specific etiquette on international sites can be unfamiliar. Internet access inconsistencies, particularly due to censorship like the Great Firewall, severely limit access to global learning materials. Finally, understanding intellectual property nuances (copyright, fair use) in international contexts is a critical, often overlooked, hurdle. Instructors are vital in helping learners overcome these obstacles for effective online engagement.
Here is a short video I made, which elaborates on key differences between English and Chinese to help Chinese learners grasp them. By distinguishing these fundamental differences, the video may assist both Chinese learners of English and English learners of Chinese in understanding the nuances of these languages.
In my opinion, Chinese learners commonly make the following mistakes in English, which I've highlighted:
Verb Tenses: This is a significant area, stemming from the absence of tense in Chinese. Specific issues include:
Confusing the usage of the present perfect and past simple.
Incorrect application of future auxiliaries (e.g., "will").
Misusing the simple present tense for ongoing actions.
Difficulties with passive voice forms and conditional tenses.
Word Morphology (Word Forms): Due to Chinese being an isolating language (where words do not change form), common difficulties are noted with:
Correctly applying verb endings (e.g., "-s" for third-person singular, "-ed" for past tense, "-ing" for continuous forms).
Forming correct noun plurals (both regular and irregular).
Using correct adjective comparisons (e.g., "-er," "-est").
Properly using pronoun cases (e.g., distinguishing between "he" and "him").
Clarity, Conciseness, and Natural Flow: Many mistakes can be attributed to challenges in sentence structure, word choice, and overall flow, which hinder the achievement of more natural, idiomatic, and concise English expression. This includes:
Avoiding redundancy in phrasing.
Improving sentence structure for better readability.
Ensuring appropriate formality and professionalism in different contexts.
I have curated some learning materials for Chinese speakers learning English, including videos and relevant books.