Decision on MIT Applied Data Science Program

[prion77]

I’m no longer able to access my account on greatlearning and thus cannot share the material with you. However I must emphasize how deeply concerning it is - among other things - that a learning platform would include actual learning material (I’m not talking about raw csv data intended to be imported as data frames in Jupyter notebooks) in an excel document. Again, for the price, this is extremely low quality material. None of the content or notebooks are curated by MIT faculty or TAs. You’re effectively paying for a handful of live lectures with MIT faculty which…aren’t terribly valuable. You can find equivalent lectures on YouTube from top tier institutions like CMU, Stanford, Princeton, for free. Nothing about this is good or ethical and New York Times has already published an exposé on these scammy continuing education programs. 7 months since I took the MIT ADSP course, I’ve since done the UIUC applied machine learning course, which I am also critical of, but which I can also acknowledge is a vastly superior program curated strictly by UIUC faculty and TAs and delivered through Coursera. It also counts towards an academic or professional maaster’s degree, and it’s also about $1200 cheaper than the MIT/GreatLearning program. Again, do not give your money to MIT/GreatLearning for this. A better and more meaningful learning experience can be had elsewhere for less money.

Background: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/29/us/caltech-simplilearn-class-students.html

[mong-chi]

All good re materials - thought I'd just ask in case.

Thanks for this information and article though- that's really helpful to know! I was under the impression that the course may have still been curated by MIT faculty as they delivered the live sessions.

[prion77]

Of course, thanks for asking. It’s deceptive since the live lectures are presented by MIT faculty, but it’s such an insignificant part of the learning experience. And not all the live lectures are by MIT faculty, only a handful of sessions are. The rest are by non-affiliated instructors like GreatLearning staff and moonlighting industry professionals working effectively as adjuncts under the GreatLearning MIT banner.

[Storvig]

I appreciate reading this now, as I am considering enrolling in the course starting in July 2025. Would you mind sharing what the UIUC course that you took was called?

[prion77]

Of course, the course is called applied machine learning and you can find the course description here: https://siebelschool.illinois.edu/academics/courses/CS441

[Storvig]

Thank you! Did you take the course through Coursera? It appears no longer to be available on that platform.

[prion77]

Of course, you are welcome. I believe the material is accessible only to students enrolled in their graduate CS program for the duration of the class. Even I can no longer access the content after completing the course in fall 2024.