This seminar will be an introduction to programming using Python with a focus on business use cases. Python has been growing in popularity over the last 30 years and is now one of the most in-demand skills even for MBAs. It can be used for things like data analysis, web scraping, natural language processing, and much more. Python is designed to be easy to read, while still being very powerful, which makes it a great language for beginners to learn.
In this seminar, we'll start with the basics of Python – variables, strings, lists, and all that stuff – with a focus on what an MBA needs to know. You'll learn how to use Python to get financial data from an API (application programming interface – a way to access stock data directly from Python without first downloading it into a CSV file), run linear regressions, and search news articles.
Students will need to bring a laptop to class and install Python in advance (instructions will be provided). Both Macs and PCs (or even Linux!) are fine, as long as your operating system is relatively up to date (at least Windows 7 and Mac OS 10.8).
Optional Reading:
Mattan Griffel is a Y Combinator-backed entrepreneur, and the Co-Founder of One Month, which offers affordable online bootcamps that teach anyone how to code in one month. He was selected as one of Forbes' 30 Under 30 in Education. Mattan teaches and advises on entrepreneurship, growth hacking, online education, and learning to code. He has advised companies like Pepsico, Bloomberg, GM, NYSE, and JPMorgan, spoken at New York University, Cooper Union, The School of Visual Arts, Parsons at The New School for Design, Singularity University, The Downtown Project, First Round Capital and Social Media Week, and has been featured in The New York Times, Forbes, BusinessWeek, MIT Technology Review, Huffington Post, Mashable and The Next Web. Mattan studied Philosophy and Finance at New York University and wrote his thesis on the metaphysics of consciousness.