MIT Professional Education’s Applied Data Science Program in collaboration with Great Learning ensures that learners are ready to excel in data science by covering essential concepts.
Jane Zou, a former alumnus of the program, is working at Aetna, a CVS Health Company, as a Senior Data Scientist. In her review of the program, she appreciates the faculty and the course structure.
“MIT professors gave a high-level overview of different machine learning algorithms; they approached the explanation with practical examples that set the program’s foundation.”
Along with the brilliant faculty, the program offers an opportunity to interact with industry experts through weekly mentoring sessions. These sessions introduce the learners to the real world from the perspective of the experts.
“I like the mentoring sessions. The mentors have years of industry experience; they helped us understand the ml concepts by working through a real problem using a Python notebook. The sessions are interactive, and the group discussions are valuable. Not only do I have answers to my questions, but I can also learn from classmates.”
The program enables a comprehensive understanding of the concepts. The teaching is not only limited to theoretical knowledge in the classrooms. The learners are allowed to explore business scenarios through hands-on projects. The projects enable them to apply the theories to actual-world problems. Jane appreciates the capstone project and mentions that,
“In the end, we chose a final capstone project that was our interest. My project was to build a classification model to minimize loan default in a retail bank. We need to use what we have learned in the course to solve the problem, including data exploration and visualization. We pick the success metrics for measuring the best model, try different ML algorithms, explain the best one by the metrics, create PowerPoint slides, and present them to a panel. The capstone project lasted four weeks, guided by the mentors. the project provided end-to-end hands-on experience which prepared us to concur the real-world problem.”
The program managers guide the learners through the project and course overall, thus ensuring a smooth and successful course completion.
“There are quite a few other small things they do making the learning easier: responsive project managers who answer questions, accommodate our needs and remind us of classes and project deliverables, there are class notes summarizing key learning points, and online recordings in case we cannot make it to the class. Last and not least, I would like to thank the program office for accommodating my specific reimbursement requirements by my company. They wrote specific notes about the certificates and prepared the specific format for payment receipt with two days’ notice.”
The program helps in the overall development of skills relating to data science.
“After the course, I better understand the fundamental algorithms. I feel I have the knowledge and skill to work on a problem from beginning to the end, starting with framing the problem, solving the problem with ML algorithms, and making recommendations to stakeholders. This course set a solid foundation for my data scientist career; I believe the professors/mentors/managers want us to succeed in life. Overall, the course is intense and fast-paced. They are serious about what we need to accomplish. I would recommend it to anyone who wants to upskill and succeed in the data science/AI field.”
This testimonial thus justifies the relevance and credibility of the courses at Great Learning.
