9 ms·

Stanford on-line Data Mining Courses ($10k for a certificate)

90 points by zeratul 15y ago

eob 15y ago
It's interesting to see the school simultaneously make a big push for free educational content online while also expanding it's for-profit online reach.
- geogra4 15y ago
  There's almost no competition between the two. Mainly because you can't really put free courses on a resume. The education is free but the credentials aren't?
  - drcode 15y ago
    Actually, you get a free certificate at the end of ai-class.com.
    - joshz 15y ago
      Not only that but prof. Ng (ml class) actually suggests putting it on a resume.
    - sown 15y ago
      Even if Professor Ng says to put it on your resume, it remains to be seen if employers will accept it as any sort of credential.
      - ramblerman 15y ago
        Some will and some won't. Seems pretty self evident...
- rch 15y ago
  Online education isn't any more free to provide than anything else. And not all courses will scale equally well either. For instance, would a data mining course include several thousand cpu hours per student? One would hope they are working towards a sustainable model for efficiently allocating education services, and doing so will require reasonable fees for some courses.
  - eob 15y ago
    Yes, you're right. I'm not criticizing their decision. With the cost of a college education skyrocketing, and "open source" education in its infancy, the moves and adaptations of the big players are just interesting to watch, is all I meant. I believe the next 10 years will birth new forms of socially-acceptable higher education, which is a pretty big deal, since the system we have to day is pretty ancient. MIT, with it's strict "information should be free" policy. Stanford, with a mixed bag approach. Harvard, with it's extension school. Johns Hopkins, with it's satellite campuses in other countries.. The big schools are all trying out different strategies to offer a variety of bundles for students looking for education.
  - softwaregravy 15y ago
    Actually, I don't see this as out of line or inconsistent at all. Providing free education classes, particularly the introduction levels, increases awareness, acclimatizes students to learning online, and they learn how to do it. (They being Stanford. They work out hiccups over servers, videos, tests, whatever in the free courses.) If Stanford then offered the next level of AI class online, but charged $1K? $3K for it, they'd get all their money back. Could turn into a classic Freemium model. On the upside, this would probably be better for students as a whole, because most of them have no idea what they're really interested in. The ability to take all the intro classes for free and then pay for the ones that are more interesting to them is pretty interesting, from a macro-societal point of view.
- sown 15y ago
  One thing to consider is that large organizations often time have business units work against each other just as a sort of accident or unclear goals.
- davidtgoldblatt 15y ago
  The reason for this is that the parts of "Stanford" (an organization comprising tens of thousands of people) involved in each push are basically unrelated. The paid-certificate program is run by the Stanford Center for Professional Development ("SCPD"), and is a trimmed down version of the online masters program. Costs here are high because courses are usually paid for by an employer investing in employee training; the SCPD program (like masters programs in general) is a profit center. The db-class, ml-class, ai-class websites (and their video-only equivalents through openclassroom and classx) are being run by the professors who teach the classes, and the goal is education. There isn't a "Stanford" policy on how online instruction should operate; just different members of a single club working independently.
tryitnow 15y ago
Nice try, but I've always been suspicious of "Certificates" even at top tier schools. The best way to signal skills to potential employers is to gain experience (either through employers or maybe through contributing to some online collective endeavor). As an employer I wouldn't want to pay people to go to school I pay them for results. Show me. I do like the fact that elite schools are offering online certificates, but for $10K there has got to be a great value proposition. I find the hard GPA requirement a little odd. So an MIT engineering alum with a 3.4 GPA wouldn't be accepted, but a liberal arts grad from a third tier school who happened to pass one probability and one linear algebra course, would be accepted?
- pavelkaroukin 15y ago
  Your approach (result-driven hiring) work well in small organization. In big organization certificates simplifies and standardize hiring process. I am not saying I support it, I am just saying this is being used and if student aims to work for big company, he probably better invest into this piece of paper.
  - raganwald 15y ago
    In big organization certificates simplifies and standardize hiring process I agree 100%. But let’s not forget that simplification and standardization are orthogonal to Results as measured by performance. The trouble is, simplification and standardization are how HR departments are measured, whereas employee performance is how line managers are measured. Thus, the companies most likely to emphasize these metrics will be the ones with HR departments. It’s not so much that big companies benefit, it’s that HR departments benefit and big companies are the ones with HR departments.
- adestefan 15y ago
  > I do like the fact that elite schools are offering online certificates, but for $10K there has got to be a great value proposition. The value proposition is that you have someone else pay for them. This is something that you can have most employers pay for as a continuing education proposition. It's the same way I got my MS without paying a dime.
droithomme 15y ago
To clear up what this is, looking at the actual program description, it's not a class or a single course. It's an entire graduate program that takes 1-3 years to complete and the total tuition for the entire program is $9900-$11700.
- adestefan 15y ago
  It's not an entire graduate program. Instead you'll usually see this called a post-graduate certificate program. It's a series of class that area all in the same specific area (in this case 3) that at the end you'll have a signed piece of paper from Stanford that says you took these classes and passed.
  - droithomme 15y ago
    Please note that I did not say it was a graduate degree, I said it was a graduate program, which is what it is. It is not a single class, it is a set of classes, with a core class, and a set of electives. A graduate program and a graduate degree are not the same thing. This is a graduate program.
    - astrec 15y ago
      Yes. Typically there are 3 tiers of graduate program by coursework (certificate, diploma, masters) and 2 tiers of graduate program by research (masters, Ph.D). Universities may offer none or all of these programs under different names. There is sometimes another tier by coursework called a "diploma for graduates" which differs from a graduate diploma in that it is usually at the undergraduate level, and very occasionally you see a Ph.D by coursework. Stanford also offers professional certificates through SCPD which are entirely distinct from their graduate program being targeted towards the continuing education market.
webspiderus 15y ago
having taken the 224W, 229, and 246 courses, I will say that they provide a good introduction to a lot of the data mining algorithms (with 224w emphasizing graph-based algorithms, 246 emphasizing things like decision trees and association rules, and 229 emphasizing regression and SVMs). however, the main issue for me is bridging the gap between completing those courses and actually being able to apply the skills learned to real-world problems. i hoped to do that with my internship this past summer, but it proved to be more difficult than i thought, particularly without having much guidance from anyone with similar specializations. how much value does a certificate like this signal then? i feel like there's not much it shows beyond commitment and a focused interest, since it seems to me that the true test of anyone in data mining comes in the form of projects, not classes.
- softwaregravy 15y ago
  So, being someone in the market to hire someone with Data Mining and AI skills, this: " i feel like there's not much it shows beyond commitment and a focused interes" is very valuable. Obviously there are other ways that may be cheaper, but this is not a bad way. The other things I look for are evidence of raw smarts and a track record of accomplishment, CS fundamentals, and, of course, personality. (Also, prefer someone with a poor understanding of Football so that they don't upset me in the fantasy league.)
  - wanorris 15y ago
    Well, if their data mining skills are good enough, they still might be a threat in your fantasy league.
    - softwaregravy 15y ago
      touche
- chugger 15y ago
  I've used SPSS and SAS for the following tasks: churn analysis, market basket analysis, sequence analysis, segmentation, anomaly detection, risk management, forecasting
littlemerman 15y ago
What are the differences between these two certificates? They seem pretty similar to me.
amandalim89 15y ago
Stanford has a lot of free courses too (Eg: this one about databases: http://www.db-class.org/course/auth/welcome http://www.db-class.org/course/auth/welcome ) and I think if one really wants to learn for the sake of learning and enrichment rather than having an official Stanford cert than these classes are good enough and you would not have to spend a fortune.
- wanorris 15y ago
  Likewise, ml-class.com is currently being offered and covers some of the material under discussion.
  - DavidChouinard 15y ago
    There's quite a substantial difference between ml-class.com and the equivalent CS 229 (Machine Learning). The former is much dumbed down, but still informative. This link gives you access to the current (2011) lecture as it's being taught, if you're interested: http://171.64.93.201/ClassX/system/users/web/pg/view_subject.php?subject=CS229_FALL_2011_2012 http://171.64.93.201/ClassX/system/users/web/pg/view_subject...
    - wanorris 15y ago
      Thanks! The only links I had seen to the full CS 229 lectures to date were from a previous instance, and they were incomplete. So far I've enjoyed CS 229A (ml-class.com) even if it has glided over a fair bit of the math, but I do want to spend time drilling down into the foundations more to make sure I know exactly why it all works the way it does and what kind of inference is valid to take from the results.
    - webspiderus 15y ago
      so, is ml-class.com then more comparable to the CS 229A class that is being offered this year? I'm taking the latter, and was wondering how similar the two are.
      - 15y ago
packetslave 15y ago
Note that this isn't necessarily just a certificate. You're able to earn normal academic graduate credits, and in many cases, you can transfer up to 18 credits from SCPD into a Stanford master's program. It also looks quite good on a grad school application.
ramblerman 15y ago
I thought it said $10 not $10K. that was 15 minutes ago, I was reading through all the courses getting genuinely excited :(

90 points by zeratul 15y ago

eob 15y ago

It's interesting to see the school simultaneously make a big push for free educational content online while also expanding it's for-profit online reach.

geogra4 15y ago
There's almost no competition between the two. Mainly because you can't really put free courses on a resume. The education is free but the credentials aren't?
- drcode 15y ago
  Actually, you get a free certificate at the end of ai-class.com.
  - joshz 15y ago
    Not only that but prof. Ng (ml class) actually suggests putting it on a resume.
  - sown 15y ago
    Even if Professor Ng says to put it on your resume, it remains to be seen if employers will accept it as any sort of credential.
    - ramblerman 15y ago
      Some will and some won't. Seems pretty self evident...
rch 15y ago
Online education isn't any more free to provide than anything else. And not all courses will scale equally well either. For instance, would a data mining course include several thousand cpu hours per student? One would hope they are working towards a sustainable model for efficiently allocating education services, and doing so will require reasonable fees for some courses.
- eob 15y ago
  Yes, you're right. I'm not criticizing their decision. With the cost of a college education skyrocketing, and "open source" education in its infancy, the moves and adaptations of the big players are just interesting to watch, is all I meant. I believe the next 10 years will birth new forms of socially-acceptable higher education, which is a pretty big deal, since the system we have to day is pretty ancient. MIT, with it's strict "information should be free" policy. Stanford, with a mixed bag approach. Harvard, with it's extension school. Johns Hopkins, with it's satellite campuses in other countries.. The big schools are all trying out different strategies to offer a variety of bundles for students looking for education.
- softwaregravy 15y ago
  Actually, I don't see this as out of line or inconsistent at all. Providing free education classes, particularly the introduction levels, increases awareness, acclimatizes students to learning online, and they learn how to do it. (They being Stanford. They work out hiccups over servers, videos, tests, whatever in the free courses.) If Stanford then offered the next level of AI class online, but charged $1K? $3K for it, they'd get all their money back. Could turn into a classic Freemium model. On the upside, this would probably be better for students as a whole, because most of them have no idea what they're really interested in. The ability to take all the intro classes for free and then pay for the ones that are more interesting to them is pretty interesting, from a macro-societal point of view.
sown 15y ago
One thing to consider is that large organizations often time have business units work against each other just as a sort of accident or unclear goals.
davidtgoldblatt 15y ago
The reason for this is that the parts of "Stanford" (an organization comprising tens of thousands of people) involved in each push are basically unrelated. The paid-certificate program is run by the Stanford Center for Professional Development ("SCPD"), and is a trimmed down version of the online masters program. Costs here are high because courses are usually paid for by an employer investing in employee training; the SCPD program (like masters programs in general) is a profit center. The db-class, ml-class, ai-class websites (and their video-only equivalents through openclassroom and classx) are being run by the professors who teach the classes, and the goal is education. There isn't a "Stanford" policy on how online instruction should operate; just different members of a single club working independently.

tryitnow 15y ago

Nice try, but I've always been suspicious of "Certificates" even at top tier schools. The best way to signal skills to potential employers is to gain experience (either through employers or maybe through contributing to some online collective endeavor). As an employer I wouldn't want to pay people to go to school I pay them for results. Show me. I do like the fact that elite schools are offering online certificates, but for $10K there has got to be a great value proposition. I find the hard GPA requirement a little odd. So an MIT engineering alum with a 3.4 GPA wouldn't be accepted, but a liberal arts grad from a third tier school who happened to pass one probability and one linear algebra course, would be accepted?

pavelkaroukin 15y ago
Your approach (result-driven hiring) work well in small organization. In big organization certificates simplifies and standardize hiring process. I am not saying I support it, I am just saying this is being used and if student aims to work for big company, he probably better invest into this piece of paper.
- raganwald 15y ago
  In big organization certificates simplifies and standardize hiring process I agree 100%. But let’s not forget that simplification and standardization are orthogonal to Results as measured by performance. The trouble is, simplification and standardization are how HR departments are measured, whereas employee performance is how line managers are measured. Thus, the companies most likely to emphasize these metrics will be the ones with HR departments. It’s not so much that big companies benefit, it’s that HR departments benefit and big companies are the ones with HR departments.
adestefan 15y ago
> I do like the fact that elite schools are offering online certificates, but for $10K there has got to be a great value proposition. The value proposition is that you have someone else pay for them. This is something that you can have most employers pay for as a continuing education proposition. It's the same way I got my MS without paying a dime.

droithomme 15y ago

To clear up what this is, looking at the actual program description, it's not a class or a single course. It's an entire graduate program that takes 1-3 years to complete and the total tuition for the entire program is $9900-$11700.

adestefan 15y ago
It's not an entire graduate program. Instead you'll usually see this called a post-graduate certificate program. It's a series of class that area all in the same specific area (in this case 3) that at the end you'll have a signed piece of paper from Stanford that says you took these classes and passed.
- droithomme 15y ago
  Please note that I did not say it was a graduate degree, I said it was a graduate program, which is what it is. It is not a single class, it is a set of classes, with a core class, and a set of electives. A graduate program and a graduate degree are not the same thing. This is a graduate program.
  - astrec 15y ago
    Yes. Typically there are 3 tiers of graduate program by coursework (certificate, diploma, masters) and 2 tiers of graduate program by research (masters, Ph.D). Universities may offer none or all of these programs under different names. There is sometimes another tier by coursework called a "diploma for graduates" which differs from a graduate diploma in that it is usually at the undergraduate level, and very occasionally you see a Ph.D by coursework. Stanford also offers professional certificates through SCPD which are entirely distinct from their graduate program being targeted towards the continuing education market.

webspiderus 15y ago

having taken the 224W, 229, and 246 courses, I will say that they provide a good introduction to a lot of the data mining algorithms (with 224w emphasizing graph-based algorithms, 246 emphasizing things like decision trees and association rules, and 229 emphasizing regression and SVMs). however, the main issue for me is bridging the gap between completing those courses and actually being able to apply the skills learned to real-world problems. i hoped to do that with my internship this past summer, but it proved to be more difficult than i thought, particularly without having much guidance from anyone with similar specializations. how much value does a certificate like this signal then? i feel like there's not much it shows beyond commitment and a focused interest, since it seems to me that the true test of anyone in data mining comes in the form of projects, not classes.

softwaregravy 15y ago
So, being someone in the market to hire someone with Data Mining and AI skills, this: " i feel like there's not much it shows beyond commitment and a focused interes" is very valuable. Obviously there are other ways that may be cheaper, but this is not a bad way. The other things I look for are evidence of raw smarts and a track record of accomplishment, CS fundamentals, and, of course, personality. (Also, prefer someone with a poor understanding of Football so that they don't upset me in the fantasy league.)
- wanorris 15y ago
  Well, if their data mining skills are good enough, they still might be a threat in your fantasy league.
  - softwaregravy 15y ago
    touche
chugger 15y ago
I've used SPSS and SAS for the following tasks: churn analysis, market basket analysis, sequence analysis, segmentation, anomaly detection, risk management, forecasting

littlemerman 15y ago

What are the differences between these two certificates? They seem pretty similar to me.

amandalim89 15y ago

Stanford has a lot of free courses too (Eg: this one about databases: http://www.db-class.org/course/auth/welcome http://www.db-class.org/course/auth/welcome ) and I think if one really wants to learn for the sake of learning and enrichment rather than having an official Stanford cert than these classes are good enough and you would not have to spend a fortune.

wanorris 15y ago
Likewise, ml-class.com is currently being offered and covers some of the material under discussion.
- DavidChouinard 15y ago
  There's quite a substantial difference between ml-class.com and the equivalent CS 229 (Machine Learning). The former is much dumbed down, but still informative. This link gives you access to the current (2011) lecture as it's being taught, if you're interested: http://171.64.93.201/ClassX/system/users/web/pg/view_subject.php?subject=CS229_FALL_2011_2012 http://171.64.93.201/ClassX/system/users/web/pg/view_subject...
  - wanorris 15y ago
    Thanks! The only links I had seen to the full CS 229 lectures to date were from a previous instance, and they were incomplete. So far I've enjoyed CS 229A (ml-class.com) even if it has glided over a fair bit of the math, but I do want to spend time drilling down into the foundations more to make sure I know exactly why it all works the way it does and what kind of inference is valid to take from the results.
  - webspiderus 15y ago
    so, is ml-class.com then more comparable to the CS 229A class that is being offered this year? I'm taking the latter, and was wondering how similar the two are.
    - 15y ago

packetslave 15y ago

Note that this isn't necessarily just a certificate. You're able to earn normal academic graduate credits, and in many cases, you can transfer up to 18 credits from SCPD into a Stanford master's program. It also looks quite good on a grad school application.

ramblerman 15y ago

I thought it said $10 not $10K. that was 15 minutes ago, I was reading through all the courses getting genuinely excited :(