Dartmouth Young Alums Share Excel Expertise with Students at MLDP Special Session

On Saturday, February 26th, MLDP held a special session focusing on Excel training. Drawing on their workplace use of Excel, Natalya Shulga ’07, a former Associate at the Parthenon Group and Strategic Planning Manager for Unlocking Potential, a non-profit school management organization, and Tom DeFalco ’09, a current Associate at the Parthenon Group,  taught session attendees the fundamentals of the program. Mr. DeFalco and Ms. Shulga introduced Excel theory and skills the group, using a comprehensive Excel workbook as a step-by-step guide to Excel functionality, with integrated practice examples. They highlighted the most pragmatic uses of certain Excel capabilities in a professional setting.

Students learned instrumental Excel skills such as spreadsheet navigation, writing mathematical and logical formulae, formatting, and database analysis. Mr. DeFalco and Ms. Shulga shared examples of spreadsheets they have created in their professional roles, and demonstrated the Excel functionalities on which they most heavily rely. They concluded the session by encouraging students that the best way to become proficient at Excel was simply to practice, and sharing that even they had a hard learning curve with their first on-the-job experiences with Excel.

-- Kristen Clifford '13