I just finished my Master’s in Electrical and Computer Engineering and am looking for an opportunity to start my career. Everyone is aware that the world is shifting towards Python as the choice of programming language with a few exceptions. Throughout my whole academic years (Undergrad and Masters), all my programming and research work was done in MATLAB.

Why I decided to learn Python

When I started to look for jobs, I would say that 99.9% of the companies did not even ask for MATLAB as a qualification. While searching for jobs, I noticed how many companies asked for Python as a “Must have” or “Good to have”. So, while going through interviews some of the interviewers even asked me to solve certain small problems using C++ or Python. In short, I found out that the industries don’t really use MATLAB. Instead, they’re using Python, C++ or Java. I quickly understood that I had to start learning one of those. I would say at the end of the day, if you know programming, you can do it in any language but it’s a timesaver if you know the language in advance. This is exactly where this specialization by University of Michigan came in handy.

Python for Everybody Specialization

The specialization was beautifully designed in five separate courses. I am currently on the 3rd one.

• Course 1: Programming for Everybody (Getting Started with Python)
• Course 2: Python Data Structures
• Course 3: Using Python to Access Web Data
• Course 4: Using Databases with Python
• Course 5: Capstone: Retrieving, Processing, and Visualizing Data with Python

There are lots of courses for Python. Before finding this course, I had already done one other course from Coursera, which I am not saying that was bad by any means, I am just happy about the way these courses were designed. Frankly, if you even go to YouTube, there are lots of different materials to learn. But, in this course, after each lecture there is a bit of refreshment such as an interview with the creator of Python language. Talking with others in the forum who took the courses was also enjoyable. It’s like you will not get bored while going through the lecture. On top of all that, there are some real-life suggestions from the Professor which will really motivate you to pursue your life goal. It really helped me and is still helping me while going through the tough time while starting my career.

One small cherry on top was the assignment submissions. If you know the language well enough, you don’t need an IDE while writing the codes, which came in handy when I was on the move but still had spare time to get the work done. You can even write the assignment and submit it on a bus as there is an online page to submit your assignments.

Conclusion

I would like to say that, if you have read this much, just start the course if you want to begin learning Python.