Looking forward to attending Microsoft Ignite virtually again, 2-4 Nov, where we'll get to hear the latest news from all our product teams, and additional updates that would normally be covered in the semi-annual Business Applications Launch Event. More details are in the blog post at Your guide to Dynamics 365 at Microsoft Ignite 2021 - Microsoft Dynamics 365 Blog.
This is also normally the time of year where I would be traveling for the American Academy of Religion and Society of Biblical Literature annual meetings, back in San Antonio this year, but I've opted to continue attending virtually for now and glad they are supporting hybrid participation for many of their sessions.
In between events and enjoying Thanksgiving break, I'll be working on finalizing my capstone project to complete my MS in Government Analytics & Intel Cert at Johns Hopkins University. I've been processing a lot of data from the US Census, FBI Crime Statistics, PRRI Census of American Religion, and several other sources to shed some light on a fundamental gap in identifying and addressing concerns for the US-based Middle Eastern & North African (MENA) population. I hope this research can support further work in this area to acknowledge and support political representation and participation of the MENA community, as well as addressing some fundamental flaws in our current government analytics, such as hate crime reporting that typically underreports or miscategorizes incidents targeting MENA victims. A recent report from the Arab American Institute helps put the problem in context: Underreported Under Threat: Hate Crime in the United States and the Targeting of Arab Americans (aaiusa.org). I'll be posting the final results of my capstone project later in December, but a prelim analysis of a subset of FBI hate crime data is available here.
So this will be a busy November (virtually) from a tech conference, to a religious conference, to academic research that can hopefully address public policy concerns of the MENA community. I've enjoyed my studies the past few years in the Johns Hopkins program, and it's great to be able to apply what I've learned across multiple disciplines to address a topic that's been a recurring source of frustration for many in the MENA community.
Reference
Microsoft Ignite Your home for Microsoft Ignite
AAR-SBL 2021 Annual Meeting Online Program Books: Online Program Book | PAPERS (aarweb.org) and SBL Meetings and Events (sbl-site.org)
Arab American Institute: Underreported Under Threat: Hate Crime in the United States and the Targeting of Arab Americans (aaiusa.org)
CeCe Winans, "Believe For It" CeCe Winans: Believe For It | GMA Dove Awards 2021 - YouTube