NYC Data Science Academy

Coming from the finance field, I had very little experience in coding. I had dabbled with a little bit of VBA where I worked, but by no means could I have claimed to know how to code. That being said, I feel this class provided me a great foundation to Python. Tony, the instructor, made sure the concepts were reinforced by easy to understand examples, and even silly examples at times which was greatly appreciated. The in class exercises were also helpful to glue the concepts together and homework was also given for more practice.  The one thing I could have suggested in terms of the weekend class itself is to perhaps allow for a longer day so the teacher do not have to rush over any particular topic. Overall, I really enjoyed this class and would recommend it to anyone who is looking to get their hands dirty with coding and data analysis.

I joined NYCDSA in late 2016, and there is no doubt about that the Data Science Bootcamp had helped me a lot in achieving my career goal. I was looking among several data science bootcamp back then, and my primary concerns were job placement rate, background of people who might join the bootcamp, and what industries had the alumni been working for. I decided to join NYCDSA because it gave me statistical answer of my concerns, not to mention how resourceful it would be speaking of its alumni network. 

The only thing that I felt they could do better, well in 2 yrs ago, would be the career service, and the design of project groups. It would be helpful to arrange people with working experience with those who may not.

 

The best thing about this program is its brand. I had several final-round interviews and some of the interviewers were from NYC. These interviewers, they know about NYCDSA, how the curriculum is organized, and how much practice students would receive from the bootcamp, so it is not challenging for me to leave some impression on them.

If you are thinking about a career switch, enrichment of experience on resume, or just an investment towards personal skillset, NYCDSA is definitely the place where you would wanna go.

 

I really enjoyed the Data Analysis and Visualization course.  I took the Intro to Python class with Tony a couple months ago, and this course (also taught by him) was a great next step in my journey towards hopefully becoming an expert in Python.  Whereas the first course gave us a great background in the basics, this one gave us a more concentrated ability to apply what we had learned to real-world problems (analyzing data and being able to display the results, which is more what you would do in a work environment).  Also, the opportunity to put together our own project at the end of the coures is extremely useful.  Highly recommend this course!

I took the Deep Learning Course from July - August 2018. This is a part time course for 5 weekends. Jon Krohn is an amazing instructor. I am a Web Engineer and have zero to little idea about Deep learning. For me to sit in class and not be intimidated by the course and fundamentals of Deep learning is a testament to Jon's teaching. The course is a really good starter kit for anyone looking to get into Deep Learning and AI in general. There is some knowledge of python that might be useful to have prior to taking this course as there are many live exercises worked on python. You will be given an opportunity to complete a project during the course which I suggest you do as it will make you apply the skills you review right after class that will make learning the concepts more enjoyable. All in all, I will 100% recommend this course for anyone who is looking to get a thorough overview of the fundamentals and philosophy of Deep Learning and its future.

The Intro to Python course was great!  Tony is a fantastic teacher who really took the time to get us acquainted with a new programming language, while simultaneously making the course challenging through both the in-class exercises and the homework assignments.  I felt the course was especially well structured, as each part really built on top of the last to provide us with a clear understanding of the basics of Python.  I highly recommend this course to anyone interested in starting on a path towards Python fluency.

I did not have experience in programming before this course. Had taken some courses in Java and pearl almost 9 years ago. I have a healthcare background and I was worried if this course will be advanced for an entry level. I can say now with confidence that this course not only taught me the basics of python and data analysis but also established a foundation to which I will be able to add advanced concepts in the future. I like the way the course was structured. Tony was punctual and the class always started on time. Tony encouraged us asking questions and was patient in explaining the concepts. Overall very happy with my decision to take this course and would recommend to anyone who is ooking to jump into the field of datascience.

I could not be more satisfied with my experience at NYC Data Science Academy. I met incredibly impressive and interesting people, learned more than I ever thought I could, made friends, and worked very hard. Within a few weeks after graduating, I was offered my first full-time job as a data engineer. (I do not come from a CS, math or stats background).  

NYCDSA is very succesful at getting their students fluent in the tools and technologies of data science, and prepared for finding great jobs in the field. The bootcamp is exhilerating, and the people are truly the best. By the end, you will be ready to for a data science position, and you will have broadened your horizons.

I took the 12-weeks bootcamp at the NYC Data Science Academy. I am a postdoc in India. I had been writing graph algorithms for social network analysis and analyzing data using MS-Excel. I decided to extend myself to data science from data analysis.

I researched for about six months to choose a proper academy to learn data science. I came up with a decision to join NYC Data Science Academy, because I can learn both R and Python within three months. But, I learnt more than I thought. I gained hands-on experience in Python, R, SQL, Spark, deep learning, Hadoop and Hive.

The materials are technically sound for job interviews. Many experienced professors and industry professionals design and teach the materials. The course laid a solid foundation in data science. The people in the academy show keen interest in every student to understand the concept, in resume writing and above all, to get a job.

I attended the 12-week boot-camp at NYC Data Science Academy from Sep. 2016 to Dec. 2016. Before that I got my PhD in Chemistry and worked 6 years' as a Post-doc in biochemistry. 

The curriculum was well organized. 12-week courses covered R and Python programming, statistical analysis and machine learning. During the last few weeks, big data tools like Hadoop and Spark were also covered. For one coming from academic background, the breadth of topics and difficulty level felt just right. The boot-camp courses weren't supposed to teach you everything, but they did prepare me very well if I wanted to explore further data science topics.   

The boot-camp was intense. I was only sleeping for 4 hours during boot-camp days. It was demanding both physically and mentally, but I wasn't alone in the journey. The instructors, TAs and classmates were all amazing. This boot-camp takes students from very different backgrounds, which I think is a unique advantage. I was able to see people applying data science tools to their own expertise brilliantly, fashion, marketing, IT, health care... It was very helpful for me who was looking to step outside of academia. 

The job assistance is good. There is networking, resume-editing and mock-interviews. Vivian also personally helps students tracking their job hunting status. I wasn't able to use lots of their services due to my personal situation, but for the one position I applied for I was able to impress the hiring manager with the machine learning knowledge and skills I acquired at NYCDSA and got an offer the same day. 

The motivation in attending a data science bootcamp generally starts with reading testimonials, which are the experiences and thoughts of past fellows. I believe that my experience as a remote participant in the Summer 2017 bootcamp is unique as the NYC Data Science Academy made it live stream to me throughout the bootcamp. This is totally different experience than doing bootcamp online as I was able to join lectures, industry expert speaker sessions, and workshops as the fellows did in person. This was indeed great opportunity for me as I was able to ask my questions during the lectures and seminars and participated actively with my comments. The crucial point here is that live streaming the bootcamp and communicating through Slack channel made it possible for the team at the Academy to track my progress in the assignments and projects daily and encouraged me to participate fully in the bootcamp.    I can definitely say that attending the NYC Data Science Academy bootcamp was one of the greatest investments in my life. I learnt how to code efficiently in R and learnt coding in Python with real life projects. I am hundred percent sure that my attendance to the bootcamp let me to find my current data science related post doctoral position. I could suggest future candidates to take some initial online courses for machine learning and deep learning, where they will find themselves more comfortable while approaching highly-technical projects in the bootcamp.    One of the strongest side of this bootcamp at the NYC Data Science Academy is the time and effort that the hiring team spends on. For remote participants, this is much more valuable than any other thing as you are receiving constant help in finding best job depending on your portfolio. And you feel that you are a member of an excellent group of data scientist. As an active learner of data science field, I recommend the NYC Data Science Academy with full of confidence.

The approach in this course was more different that what I've seen in most workshops on this topic. It was more visual because Deep Learning sometimes requires mathematical derivations to understand the algorithms. I have read a few seminal Google papers on the topic and they're not alwasys easy to follow. John did not dive too much into this area and preferred to use powerpoint slides and diagrams by hand to explian it before we looked at the code.

Overall the coding portion was made easier by John's coding style and we were able to follow along with the Keras modules. However, we did not get to cover all the topics (like autoencoders or deep belief networks) that I've seen other presentations get into and I would have liked to learn more. But the foucs on NLP and the last topic on GAN got me more curious about those topics. I would recommend it to those who want to learn it more and I would even be willing to talk about what I tried as a result of taking the course in any future session that he runs with a new group.

 

I was previously a student in one of the early cohorts of for the 12-Week Data Science Boot Camp, and it was one of the best experiences for my career.

Before going into lengthy detail, I will break this up into three sections: Before, During, and After in the hope of conveying a more comprehensive experience. 

Before:

Before attending the NYCDSA, I had just finished my undergraduate degree in an engineering field.  After taking an Intro ML course my senior year, I grew increasingly interested in the applications of AI and Machine Learning in industry.  When I discovered the field of data science, I was instantly hooked, but I knew I needed to learn more. 

I had a decent amount of programming experience, mostly with low-level languages and systems, but lacked statistical intuition and experience with scripting langauges.  After some more digging, I knew that my skillset at the time would not be competitive for the actual job market.  While my undergraduate education was excellent, the curriculum was reasonably classic, most of my courses focused on theory and textbook problems and what I lacked was skills and experience for real-world applications.  While graduate school was an option, at the time I wasn't sure if Data Science was a field I wanted to commit more formal education to without experiencing it first hand.  So after applying to various boot camps, I chose the NYCDSA to jumpstart my career. 

The interviewing process for the NYCDSA was simple and effective and included phone screens, code exercises, and some Q&A.  I chose this program because the company was relatively new and small and felt more like a community rather than a factory to churn out data scientists like other boot camps I came across.  After making my decision, I promptly moved to NYC after graduating and began my journey into data science. 

 

During:

The company was relatively new at the time I attended, but the caliber and experience of their faculty were top-notch, and it was transparent how passionate the staff was about developing the best and most efficient curriculum.  Within another couple of years, they were able to scale up, expand, and further improve their curriculum and course content at an exponential rate.

It is important to note that your mileage may vary with any boot camp.  This program offers awesome resources, but ultimately it's up to the student to determine how much he or she will get out of it.  I spent an average of 60~90 hours a week on campus for the 12-week program.  The course is still manageable for people who have families or other commitments, and I have seen many successful part-time students graduate from my cohort.  I just wanted to note that this was particular to my experience.  

The curriculum covers various aspects of data science and offers a cutting-edge foundational overview of stats, machine learning, and programming.  The core languages are R and Python.  The philosophy of spreading the breadth of languages rather than just choosing one is reflective of the fact that the tools in Data Science are highly mutable.  Rather than memorizing a single programming paradigm, the goal is to expand your programmatic and discrete logic intuition so that you can pick up other languages if needed.

After class, the projects were engaging, and it was enjoyable to engage with other data enthusiasts and attend data science meetups and conferences together.  I still keep in touch with many of my cohort mates years after the program. 

Moreover, Vivian and company have a robust network of many NYC companies and quickly expanding to other areas of the country.  By the 9th week, I've already had a couple of interviews lined up at top firms in the area and was able to practice and refine my onsite interviewing skills.  

Three months after the boot camp, I landed my dream first job at a fast-growing tech-startup in Chicago after receiving multiple offers.

 

After:

After landing my role as a Data Scientist, I still maintained a close relationship with the NYCDSA.

The support of the NYCDSA does not terminate at the end of the cohort, and they do a phenomenal job of providing ongoing support for their alumni and students.  After the boot camp, I've continued to receive ongoing help (practice interviews, coding exercises, access to review course content, network events, resume editing) which were crucial to my future employment.

Not only do they offer support for students seeking employment but they provide support for education as well.  I was actively interested in an advanced degree in a field that leverages machine learning, and my experience at the boot camp only affirmed this for me.    Many of the faculty come from incredible backgrounds and are very willing to share their experiences.  Their advice and transparency were constructive in my choice of graduate program.  Currently, I am a part-time Masters candidate at a top data science program with a focus on Machine Learning and Data Ethics while working full-time as a data scientist at my current company. 

The skills that I learned from the NYCDSA and later refined at my current company significantly prepared me for my graduate courses, allowing me to test out of basic classes and attend advanced topics in machine learning and statistics.   The skills from the boot camp carry over very well for most data science roles or education programs.

In short, what I wish to convey is that a career in data science is a journey of continual learning and NYCDSA does everything they can to optimize the learning experience for their students.

However, please note that the Data Science Bootcamp is tailored to provide balanced curriculum among programming, stats, and machine learning and is meant to be a program to strengthen core skillsets rather than a masterclass for already experienced data science veterans.  Although the company does offer more specialized classes in more targeted areas. 

If you are looking for a program that will teach you everything there is to know about data science within a mere few months, then I'm afraid that those may be in general hard to find since data science itself is both a hybrid of multiple subjects and growing as a professional field. 

On the other hand, if you are serious about transitioning into data science as a career and if you are seeking a program that offers competitive curriculum, a strong alumni network, and a community of data enthusiasts to engage with, I would strongly recommend looking into this program to jumpstart your career.  I cannot emphasize enough how much this program has benefitted my professional development both during and after the boot camp. 

 

 

 

Attending the NYCDSA 12-week bootcamp is the best career decision I've ever made. I came to it after finishing my PhD in math and working for a year in academia. I wanted to get into data science for lots of reasons (leveraging my background, interesting problems, ample job opportunities, interest in coding, good pay, etc.) but after spending six years in graduate school, the last thing I wanted to do was go back to school for two years to learn basic data science skills.

This program allowed me to do this career change quickly without compromising the quality of the material I learned. The program emphasizes sound foundations in coding in R and Python and in both the theory and application of machine learning. The pace is very fast but you learn and do an incredible amount in those 12 weeks. Even when full absorption of the material isn't possible, the bootcamp does a great job of exposing you to tools and concepts you'll need to be familiar with later. 

The projects are incredibly valuable for building skills and exposing future employers to your work. You would be spending your money wisely just to come and complete the projects.

The bootcamp students and the TAs/instructors have varied backgrounds, which also makes for a great environment because you can learn from everyone. The entire company - from fellow students to TAs to instructors to the CTO and COO - is filled with smart, hardworking people who are pushing to help you reach your potential. 

WHY Data Science and WHY NYCDSA: I had no idea about data science until 2016 Feb when Alphago defeated Li Shishi and it was the first time for me to get to know what is Artificial Intelligence and what is machine learning. Bringing my huge curiosity, I self-learnt an online Machine Learning course on Coursera and was able utilize the skill , for the first time, in my working project and had a positive outcome. Being proud of my achievement, I also realized there was still a long way down the road.  This is actually the reason why I decided to join bootcamp -  fully armed myself with comprehensive data science skillset and then shifting my career towards a new page. NYCDSA is a perfect choice for me as it teaches anything you need to know to work as junior data scientist and allows you to keep full time job as the same time.

 

Experience: Even though it is an part-time online bootcamp, I was investing 40+ hours / week on studying slides, having office hour with TA and doing projects with current full time students. The bootcamp starts with an introduction Toolkits (Unix,Git,SQL,etc.), followed by introduction to R/Python, then followed by statistics and machine learning immediately applied using R and Python. The comprehensive curriculum is completed by an introduction to Big Data tools. I was able to finish a strong portfolio with 4 projects in Shiny App, Web Scraping, Kaggle and Capstone. I learned a lot especially by collaborating with full time students and TAs, so I would strongly recommend those online students who are physically in NYC, walk in the classroom and collaborate with full-time students on your last two projects.

 

In terms of job assistance, NYCDSA can provide tremendous assistance on your job hunting after your graduation. Vivian and Chris know what you need to have on your resume to catch HR’s eye and get an interview, and they have a strong network which can expose you to much more opportunities.

 

Outcome: I finally received offer from 2 Top insurance companies, 2 Top hospitals, and 2 boutique consulting companies. I feel my investment of 7 months of study and $16K totally worth as it allows me to finally launch my dream job. Thank you New York City Data Science Academy and I would recommend it to anyone who has same dream to be a data scientist.

 

I came to New York City Data Science Academy because I wanted to become a better coder, to  become more knowledgeable about machine learning, and to get a better job. Having completed the bootcamp in the Spring of 2017, I can say that through the Data Science Academy, I was able to accomplish all three.

Before the bootcamp

Previous to the bootcamp, I had a job as a data analyst which gave me the exposure SQL, Linux, Hadoop, and some Python - all tools that are taught in the academy. I knew I wanted to improve my overall problem solving approach, specifically using Python and R. After a few years as an analyst, and many months of debating if enrolling in a machine learning bootcamp was worth the time and money, I decided to go for it. Although I do not have a masters degree like many of my fellow cohort members, I knew that I could use my work experience to my advantage in preparing for the bootcamp. Like many others have stated, giving yourself enough time to go over the 100+ hours of prep work before the bootcamp is highly advised - being able to perform the basics of Python and R will set you up for success.

Preparing before the bootcamp is also crucial in another way. As you spend more time studying, you spend less time doing all the other normal things you’re used to doing in your life. In order to make the most out of the bootcamp, sacrifices must be made, from your social life, to your eating and sleeping habits, and to the amount of coffee you normally drink. If you don’t get used to it before, adjusting to these changes midway through the bootcamp can be a challenge.

During the bootcamp.

If you spend enough time preparing before the start of the bootcamp, then the first month or so should not be too challenging (but still very useful). Many of my fellow cohorts actually became nervous, thinking that our investment in the bootcamp might not have been worth it. Don’t fret. After going over the basics again, the fun truly begins.

After the first month, you will spend every day learning machine learning concepts, applications, statistics, and then applying these techniques in both Python and R. This is no easy task in a few short months, which is why the instructors, teaching assistants, and Vivian, deserve so much credit in churning out so many qualified data scientists in such short time. The instructors are always, at all times, helping and guiding you in the right direction. On top of that, you have the additional resource of working with your fellow cohort members, all who have unique backgrounds and always willing to help.

In the end, the journey would not be worth it without days of extreme struggle and frustration. Some days I felt really confident in the material, other days I did not think I had what it takes to be successful. What I believe the instructors are best at is instilling the confidence in each and every student, spending as much time with you as needed to successfully complete the projects.

The last few weeks are spent on tidying up your resume, github, blog posts, and interview skills. Aside from learning both R and Python in the bootcamp, one of the reasons why I chose the Data Science Academy was because of the strong professional connections that Vivian and the team have developed over time. The final day is dedicated to a networking event, where the ratio of companies to students is almost 1 to 1. Although it can be a bit nerve wracking, Vivian and the team do a good job of preparing you on what to expect.

After the bootcamp

I was lucky enough to land an internship at a startup as a data science intern from one of the participating companies at our networking event. I have to give my experience to the bootcamp all the credit for this. Had I not had relevant experience and projects to speak of, I would not have been able to land the job. As my internship was coming to an end, I spent more time with Vivian and the team doing mock interviews, going over practice questions, asking for help on take home assignments, and constantly reviewing. Without a doubt, I can say that the three months of the bootcamp was the second hardest thing I’ve ever done - the first hardest thing was getting a job afterwards.

Vivian and the instructors have the uncanny ability of knowing what specific skills you need to improve on, based on constant back and forth communication based off of past interviews, as well as the interviews you eventually take. You will fail, and fail a lot. Most data science interviews are designed to test you on the very limit of your knowledge on data science subjects. With practice, you will answer the questions confidently, and even if you are unsure of a question, you will be able to communicate a thorough data science process on how you think the question could be answered. If you fail an interview, it’s another lesson on how to improve for your next interview, which Vivian will most likely have helped you set up already.

After months and months of dedicating my life to all data science related activities, I have landed a job as a data lead at a media company, and have the entire NYC Data Science Academy program to thank for it. If you are seriously considering a future career in data science, then I can 100% vouch for the academy, so long as you are ready to work harder than you have ever worked in your entire life. At the end of the day, it’s all worth it.

 

Machine Learning is transforming the world at an incredible pace and I felt it was imperative for me to acquire new skills in order to be professionally relevant. The summer bootcamp fit my schedule perfectly and I decided to enroll to better understand this exciting new field. With a PhD in Engineering from a top-five ranked school and significant background in Computational Materials Science, I felt that I had sufficient background to be successful in the bootcamp. Due to my hectic schedule, I was unable to complete all the pre-work prior to the bootcamp and I believe that this had an impact in my learning experience at the later stages of the bootcamp. In my opinion, pre-work is analogous to binary decision trees—you are trained to be independent weak learners ahead of the bootcamp. The actual bootcamp is more like a random forest where individual students work alongside other students as well as Teaching Assistants and Course Instructors to significantly contribute on a variety of real world projects related to Data Visualization, Web Scraping, Machine Learning and Big Data. The course is fast paced and students are exposed to a variety of technologies relevant to Data Science. The instructors are knowledgeable and fellow students in the cohort are sharp. It is not surprising that NYC Data Science Academy is one of SwitchUp’s Top Bootcamps of 2017. I strongly recommend this bootcamp to individuals who are seriously interested to pursue a full-time career in Data Science.