Kenny Flagg

Data Scientist : Statistician : Dancer : Aspiring Nomad : Amateur Musician

Software and Web Development

Starlite Course Catalog Webpage

  • Client: Starlite Studios
  • Project Type: Website development
  • Capacity: freelance consultant

Project Summary

The client owns a dance studio which offers classes at a facility operated by the local municipal recreation department. Class registration was handled on a third-party platform purchased by the recreation department, which impeded the client’s ability to provide self-service online registration and inconvenienced students.

Screenshot of the Starlite website showing a schedule grid of upcoming dance class offerings.

Services Provided

  • Developed an API client using JavaScript and Wix’s Velo library to import course data from the third-party platform.
  • Created a catalog page automatically populated with current course offerings and up-to-date registration links.
  • Improved efficiency by eliminating broken links and redundant maintainance of the catalog on multiple platforms.

La Brasserie Website Enhancements

  • Client: La Brasserie
  • Project Type: Website development
  • Capacity: freelance consultant

Project Summary

The client had recently acquired and rebranded a restaurant, and needed several enhancements to the newly revised website.

Screenshot of the La Brasserie website showing a gallery of photos of the interior of the restaurant.

Screenshot of the La Brasserie website showing a description of the pop-up dinner series featuring a guest chef.

Services Provided

  • SEO audit and enhancements.
  • Created an animated photo gallery page.
  • Created a new information and reservation page for a pop-up guest chef series.
  • Set up online ordering for the wine club.

Data Consulting

Analysis of Atrial Fibrillation and Heart Rate Variability Time Series Data

  • Client: Alan Wanderer
  • Project Type: data analysis
  • Capacity: freelance consultant

Bar chart showing the percent of days in each month

Project Summary

The client, a retired research MD, self-administered an experimental magnesium supplementation regimen with the hypothesis that it would manage his atrial fibrillation (AF). He collected monthly AF detection and heart rate variability (HRV) data via his Apple Watch. He produced a chart which appeared to show a compelling confirmation of his hypothesis, and requested an independent statistical analysis to quantify the effect. The analysis would be used in a chapter of a book he was authoring.

Services Provided

  • Identified and performed appropriate statistical tests.
  • Provided a detailed report with data summaries and accurate statistical language.
  • Reviewed the relevant portion of the manuscript.

Analysis of an Electric Fence Permeability Experiment

  • Client: Brittani Johnson
  • Project Type: MS thesis
  • Capacity: graduate assistant consultant at MSU SCRS

Point-and-range plot showing the proportion of successful crossings of electric fences by bear for short and tall fences, with the electricity both on and off. Both designs perform similarly at deterring passage when electrified, but the tall fence has a greater improvement in passage rate when the electricity is off

Project Summary

The client, a master’s student in the Department of Animal and Range Sciences at Montana State University, had conducted an experiment regarding selective permeability of electric fences to grizzly bears. The objective was to assess which of two fence designs was better at preventing passage when powered on, while also not impeding the natural movements of bears throughout their habitat when powered off. Triangular enclosures of either fence design were set up at locations around the Blackfoot Valley in western Montana. Bait was placed at the center of each enclosure. The fences were alternately powered on and off for several days at a time while trail cameras filmed interactions between grizzly bears and the fences.

Services Provided

  • Provided recommendations on model/method selection.
    • The initial recommendation was to use generalized estimating equations to implement logistic regression to estimate the probability of bear passage, but this was not possible because of small success counts at some locations.
    • Several nonparametric hypothesis tests for multidimensional contingency tables were used instead.
  • Carried out the analysis in R.
  • Computed binomial confidence intervals and generated plots summarizing the data.

Analysis of an Advance Directives Completion Intervention

Scatterplot showing number of comorbidities against patient age, colored by status of having an advance directive. No patterns are apparent.

Project Summary

The client, a doctor of nursing practice student in the College of Nursing at Montana State University, had conducted a survey about knowledge of advance directives among patients aged 65 and older at a family practice clinic in rural southwestern Montana. The client also implemented an intervention where those patients were provided with educational materials about advance directives during their clinic visits. The survey was conducted both before and during the intervention period, and the objective was to assess if the intervention was associated with greater rates of patients having advance directives.

Stacked bar chart showing the percent of patients having an advance directive by age group, for patients seen pre- and post-intervention. The percent of patients with advance directives increases with age, but slightly more of the pre-intervention patients had advance directives compared to the post-intervention patients.

Services Provided

  • Provided recommendations on model/method selection. A logistic regression GLM was used.
  • Carried out analysis in R.
  • Generated plots summarizing the data.
  • Recommended wording to explain the statistical methods and results.

Stacked bar chart showing the percent of patients having an advance directive by number of visits to the clinic, for patients seen pre- and post-intervention. The percent of patients with advance directives increases with number of visits, but slightly more of the pre-intervention patients had advance directives compared to the post-intervention patients.

Analysis of a Mental Health Stigma Survey

  • Client: Sarah Keller
  • Project Type: internal report upon which the client based several talks and posters
  • Capacity: graduate assistant consultant at MSU SCRS

Project Summary

The client, a professor in the Department of Communication and Theatre at Montana State University, Billings, had conducted an experiment to assess if an online video-based intervention could reduce stigma around discussing suicide and mental health among college students at a university in Montana. Participants were assigned to one of two treatment groups or to a control group, and completed a questionnaire before viewing a video and then completed the same questionnaire again two weeks later. The videos viewed by the treatment groups were based upon an acclaimed theatre program in which local high school and college students discussed their experiences with depression and suicidal ideation, and the questionnaire included the Self-Stigma of Seeking Help survey instrument.

Services Provided

  • Provided recommendations on model/method selection. A linear regression model was used.
  • Conducted psychometric evaluation of the survey instrument.
  • Carried out analysis in R.
  • Generated plots summarizing the data.
  • Recommended wording to explain the statistical methods and results.

Analysis of a Food Security Survey

Project Summary

The client, a master’s student in the Department of Health and Human Development at Montana State University, had conducted a survey where residents of the Flathead Indian Reservation in western Montana provided interviews and responded to a questionnaire regarding their food security, their use of wild foods, and their identities as Native Americans. The objective was to assess the impact of hunting and gathering on both food security and cultural identity in the context of climate change affecting food availability.

Services Provided

  • Provided guidance on model/method selection and implementation in JMP.
  • Recommended wording to explain the statistical methods and results.
  • Copyedited the manuscript.

Personal Projects

Trend and Correlation Analysis of Several ETFs

Log-scale plot of daily values of several index funds and ETFs. UVXY and SQQQ generally decay over time and FXAIX is very stable. The others move up and down together. The values are normalized to be 100% at the end of March 2024.

I conducted this analysis for a blog post. The objective was to take an interesting topic (exchange-traded funds with surprisingly consistent pricing behavior) and illustrate what a data analysis looks like when it avoids scope creep and unnecessary complexity. The post follows the process of making some initial observations, developing hypotheses, obtaining relevant data, and drawing insights from straightforward visuals and summary statistics. Although the analysis proved inconclusive regarding the initial hypotheses, and I thought of many new questions for further analysis along the way, I made a point of sticking to the original purpose and scope.