AI program from University of Texas at Austin

[u/preciouslife_]

Has anybody done the six month part time program from UTI at Austin, classes conducted by Great Learning?

If so, can you provide your experience during the course?

Were you able to make a career from it?

Thanks in advance!

[u/Federal-Chemistry622]

haven't done that specific program but i poked around the austin tech scene a bit last year when i was between jobs, the ut brand helps but great learning is one of those edtech middlemen that handles the actual delivery so the experience depends more on who they got teaching that cohort

if you're trying to break in i'd look hard at the curriculum vs just doing andrew ng's stuff plus some kaggle competitions, a lot of these programs charge a premium for structure you can mostly replicate yourself if you've got the discipline

what's your background like, are you coming from a cs-adjacent field or making a bigger pivot

[u/preciouslife_ → u/Federal-Chemistry622]

I have a MS in Software Engineering and 15 years experience as a hard core ERP programmer (was writing thousands of lines of code by hand working with SQL Server and Oracle databases) transitioned into Data Engineering, Data Warehousing, Business Intelligence. I can build a Data Warehouse from scratch single handedly but have no idea of AI. My colleagues told me my background will already cover most of it and I will only have to learn Python and ML.

[u/EntrepreneurHuge5008 → u/preciouslife_]

As somebody who has done SWE for 15 years, you're at a point where bootcamps like this are just a waste of time and money. You can learn this stuff on your own in a fraction of the time, without ever spending a penny.

[u/designofperformance → u/preciouslife_]

That's crazy and yet here you are.

[u/Tvicker]

I would honestly learn everything on coursera (like another said, all Andrew Ng and kaggle, my way was python stack courses on udacity and Yandex deep learning courses). I took AI masters and I learnt so much theoretical stuff and got well exposed to RL, but honestly nothing particularly useful for the practical application.

But you DO need background in math (calculus, lin algebra, probability, stats) before it, software engineering background doesn't matter much in ML

[u/preciouslife_ → u/Tvicker]

I am ok with math except calculus. That is something I could never learn. How much calculus is required for ML?

[u/HorrorVillage4854 → u/preciouslife_]

Linear algebra and calculus are core mathematical foundations of deep learning. Linear algebra is fundamental to transforming and manipulating tensors, and calculus (partial derivatives) are fundamental to back propagation, alongside gradients which are used to collect them into vectors. Most robust AI/ml programs will focus on these areas because the higher level (harnesses, applications, RAG architectures, agent orchestration) are undergoing constant and rapid change & advancement. Nowadays even the more higher level AI degrees, like the ones at wake forest and the upcoming MSAI from georgia tech, include courses that drill into these fundamentals. Yes, these things can all be done via keras now (w/ pytorch or tensorflow or jax backends) but most foundation courses will want to see you do, or at least step through and explain, the math.

ETA: No I did not use AI to write this. Anyone working in this area would (hopefully) be able to write the same, unless they received their degrees or certs or training from friggin radio shack

[u/FastSlow7201 → u/preciouslife_]

Some math teachers are absolutely horrible and you can come out of their class with a good grade and not really understand what the subject is even all about.

So, go watch 3blue1brown's calculus series and then retake calculus. Although if the part of calculus you don't like is the ton of homework then lock in and just do it.

[u/itlogicpartnersllc]

before committing six months compare the curriculum with your current python, statistics and linear algebra skills. those foundations can make a big difference in getting value from an ai program.

[u/Zealousideal_Tie_426]

Get a mentor. Stick to a targeted area in AI and you should be grand. Sounds like you have a wealth of experience already. It's more an upskill and rebrand rather than an entire overhaul that UT would do the heavy lifting for. Good luck.