Course Plan: Python, Data Analytics, and Generative AI

Session 1: Python Refresher

- Python essentials (data types, loops, conditionals)

- Functions and modules

- File handling (CSV/Excel)

- Pythonic coding practices

Practical Focus

- Write a function to load a CSV file and summarize basic statistics.

Session 2: Data Analysis with pandas and NumPy

- pandas DataFrame basics: loading, slicing, merging

- NumPy arrays: indexing, slicing, reshaping

- Descriptive statistics (mean, median, variance)

Practical Focus

- Analyze a CSV dataset (e.g., sales data) to extract summary statistics.

Session 3: Data Wrangling and Cleaning

- Handling missing data: dropna, fillna

- String manipulations and date conversions

- Combining and reshaping datasets (merge, concat, pivot)

Practical Focus

- Clean a messy dataset by handling missing values, converting data types, and merging files.

Session 4: Exploratory Data Analysis (EDA)

- Visualizing distributions (histograms, box plots)

- Identifying patterns and outliers

Practical Focus

- Perform EDA on a dataset (e.g., customer data) to identify trends and relationships.

Session 5: Introduction to Machine Learning

- Machine Learning basics: supervised vs. unsupervised

- Overview of ML workflow: data preprocessing → model training → evaluation

- Common ML use cases in business

Practical Focus

- Discuss business-relevant ML use cases and map them to available datasets.

Session 6: Supervised Learning – Regression

- Linear Regression: simple and multiple

- Scikit-learn ML pipeline

- Model evaluation: MSE, RMSE, MAE

Practical Focus

- Build a linear regression model to predict sales/revenue from a dataset.

Session 7: Supervised Learning – Classification

- Logistic Regression, Decision Trees

- Evaluation metrics: accuracy, precision, recall, F1-score

- Confusion matrix interpretation

Practical Focus

- Train a logistic regression model to classify customers as likely churners or not.

Session 8: Model Evaluation and Validation

- Hyperparameter tuning (GridSearchCV, RandomizedSearchCV)

- Bias-variance tradeoff

Practical Focus

- Perform cross-validation and hyperparameter tuning on a classification or regression

Session 9: Feature Engineering

- Encoding categorical variables

- Feature scaling (standardization, normalization)

- Creating new features from existing data

Practical Focus

- Engineer features (e.g., date-based, interactions) to improve a machine learning model.

Session 10: Unsupervised Learning – Clustering

- K-means clustering

- Applications: customer segmentation, anomaly detection

- Cluster evaluation: silhouette score

Practical Focus

- Perform K-means clustering to segment customers and analyze cluster profiles.

Session 11: Ensemble Methods

- Random Forest and Gradient Boosting (XGBoost/LightGBM)

- Bagging vs. Boosting

- Practical tips for tuning ensembles

Practical Focus

- Train a Gradient Boosting model to improve classification accuracy.

- Writing advanced SQL queries (joins, subqueries, window functions)

- Query optimization and indexing

- Integrating SQL queries into Python (using sqlite3 or SQLAlchemy)

Practical Focus

- Query and analyze data from an SQL database integrated with a Python script.

Session 13: Introduction to Generative AI (GenAI)

- Overview of Generative AI (text generation, summarization)

- Working with pre-trained LLMs (e.g., Hugging Face transformers)

- Introduction to prompt engineering

Practical Focus

- Generate text summaries or insights from a dataset using an LLM.

Session 14: Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) – Concepts

- How RAG combines retrieval systems with generative models

- Use cases for RAG in business (Q&A, report generation, decision support)

- Overview of vector databases (e.g., FAISS, Pinecone)

Practical Focus

- Sketch a workflow where queries fetch relevant data to feed into a generative model.

Session 15: Building the CSV Analytics Tool – Design

- Requirements for a CSV analytics tool (querying, summarizing, filtering)

- Efficient file handling for large datasets (chunking)

- Designing user-friendly outputs (charts, tables)

Practical Focus
- Draft the logic for a CSV analytics module that summarizes key metrics interactively.

Session 16: Implementing the CSV Analytics Tool

- Building core functionalities: query execution, metric calculations, visualizations

- Error handling and logging

- Exporting insights (e.g., saving summaries to Excel/CSV)

Practical Focus

- Build the CSV analytics tool and test it on real-world datasets.

Session 17: SQL Integration for RAG

- Querying SQL databases for context retrieval

- Converting SQL results into context for LLMs

- Handling large datasets and dynamic query results

Practical Focus

- Write Python code to retrieve data from SQL, format it, and prepare it for a generative
model.

Session 18: Building the RAG-Based Chatbot

- Connecting the chatbot to SQL and CSV modules

- Structuring prompts dynamically based on user queries

- Handling missing data or ambiguous queries

Practical Focus

- Build an initial RAG-based chatbot pipeline that retrieves context and generates responses.

Session 19: Testing and Refining the GenAI Project

- Testing edge cases for the CSV tool and RAG chatbot

- Handling incomplete user inputs or noisy data

- Improving performance and response accuracy

- Test the combined system, focusing on query accuracy, response quality, and speed.

Session 20: Advanced Features and Final Review

- Adding advanced features: embedding-based similarity search, interactive filtering

- Business scalability considerations (security, multi-user support)

- Future enhancements: extending RAG or adding predictive analytics

Practical Focus

- Explore extensions, such as adding ML-driven recommendations or summarization