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Learner Reviews & Feedback for Mastering Data Analysis in Excel by Duke University

4.2
stars
3,924 ratings

About the Course

Important: The focus of this course is on math - specifically, data-analysis concepts and methods - not on Excel for its own sake. We use Excel to do our calculations, and all math formulas are given as Excel Spreadsheets, but we do not attempt to cover Excel Macros, Visual Basic, Pivot Tables, or other intermediate-to-advanced Excel functionality. This course will prepare you to design and implement realistic predictive models based on data. In the Final Project (module 6) you will assume the role of a business data analyst for a bank, and develop two different predictive models to determine which applicants for credit cards should be accepted and which rejected. Your first model will focus on minimizing default risk, and your second on maximizing bank profits. The two models should demonstrate to you in a practical, hands-on way the idea that your choice of business metric drives your choice of an optimal model. The second big idea this course seeks to demonstrate is that your data-analysis results cannot and should not aim to eliminate all uncertainty. Your role as a data-analyst is to reduce uncertainty for decision-makers by a financially valuable increment, while quantifying how much uncertainty remains. You will learn to calculate and apply to real-world examples the most important uncertainty measures used in business, including classification error rates, entropy of information, and confidence intervals for linear regression. All the data you need is provided within the course, all assignments are designed to be done in MS Excel, and you will learn enough Excel to complete all assignments. The course will give you enough practice with Excel to become fluent in its most commonly used business functions, and you’ll be ready to learn any other Excel functionality you might need in the future (module 1). The course does not cover Visual Basic or Pivot Tables and you will not need them to complete the assignments. All advanced concepts are demonstrated in individual Excel spreadsheet templates that you can use to answer relevant questions. You will emerge with substantial vocabulary and practical knowledge of how to apply business data analysis methods based on binary classification (module 2), information theory and entropy measures (module 3), and linear regression (module 4 and 5), all using no software tools more complex than Excel....

Top reviews

TB

Nov 16, 2021

I like and appreciate courses provided through Coursera.This course is very interesting and valuable for those whose jobs do have relevance with data management .God bless Coursera and Duke University

JE

Oct 30, 2015

The course deserves a 5-star rating because: (1) content is relevant, (2) the professor is concise and possesses great teaching skills, and (3) the learning modules are applicable to daily problems.

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726 - 750 of 938 Reviews for Mastering Data Analysis in Excel

By 王伟

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Nov 17, 2015

it is too complicated for me this courese, not very useful for daily work. but anyway i

By Jared V

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Feb 10, 2016

This course was over my head academically and I was able to glean very little from it.

By Chris H

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Dec 12, 2015

They have a lot of good material. It will probably be better the second time around.

By Jongah K

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Nov 2, 2019

not recommend if you want to learn about Excel. More fore stat/analytics in general

By Qian W

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May 12, 2016

could have lecture more.... the videos talks little about the spreadsheet provided

By Thuong N T

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Feb 28, 2023

This course is challenging for me. I don't completely understand all knowledge.

By tressie p

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Jul 12, 2020

it seems like there need to be some prerequisities to this class, like finance.

By Samhita A

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Jul 2, 2020

It was a bit too fast and there is a lot of math formulas than I expected

By César R

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Jul 4, 2016

The order and content of the lessons wasn't planned with sufficient care.

By Sebastiaan B

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Aug 17, 2016

The second test should be compulsory for also the non-paying students!

By Sobhy K

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Jul 30, 2021

I think it is a course in statistics, there are many missing concepts

By Steven T

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May 15, 2018

The content was very useful but I felt that instruction was lacking

By demehin I

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Jan 31, 2016

still needs a better way of explaining the diversity of the course

By Luke R

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Apr 6, 2017

Good Course, but final project asks a lot for what this course is

By steven u

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Nov 22, 2015

Good intro and fundamentals, but focuses far too much on finance.

By Diogo H M d F T

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Jul 7, 2016

Superficial, esboça assuntos de estatística e mal fala do excel.

By 张之晗(ZhiHan Z

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Sep 9, 2017

So many terminologies, can you talk those principles concisely?

By Cherie L

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Sep 19, 2016

Very hard to comprehend for 6 weeks. But could have been great.

By Bernhard K

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Feb 28, 2016

Way too theoretical. This is Excel, not Information Theory....

By Ernesto R

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Mar 11, 2016

Not enough practices for the unexperienced students.

By Scott R

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Oct 21, 2020

Definitely way more statistics than I expected.

By Neelam M

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Jul 27, 2016

inclination was more towards concept than excel

By SARAH S A

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Jul 18, 2017

Tough Course.. Need Mathematical Background

By Yohann B

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Feb 6, 2016

good, but no material and lack of structure

By Ricardo C

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Dec 8, 2018

Too much theory and no excel learings.