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Course Overview

Welcome!

Welcome to ReDI School! We really appreciate that you are part of our community. In this page, you'll find an overview of the course. By volunteering, you contribute to our main goal: help our students gain the necessary skills to find a job in tech. ReDI School has now helped over 17.000 people advance their tech skills. This is only possible with the support of our volunteers <3

Our Students

Come from 138+ countries with diverse professional backgrounds
Average age: 32, many with university degrees and work experience
Data Circle Students have prior knowledge in Python, Data Analytics, and/or Machine Learning
A mix of ReDI alumni and new students with varying skill levels
United by their passion for tech and career growth goals

❤️ Thank you for supporting our students as they take another step in their journey! To learn more about ReDI students and our community, visit About ReDI School.

Learning Concept

The Data Circle takes a hands-on approach to learning through realistic projects. Instead of traditional lectures, students work actively on data analysis or machine learning projects in small teams. This means students learn by doing - working on their code, analyzing data, and solving problems independently. The guides (you) support and steer students in the right direction. Nonetheless, we ask the students to be the main drivers behind the project. Each team tackles a semester-long project in three sprints, allowing students to apply their skills to real challenges while receiving regular guidance and feedback. This approach helps students build not just technical skills but also the independence and problem-solving abilities needed for a career in data science.

You can read more about what we share with the students on the applicant hub.

Project Structure

Timeline

Setup Phase (Weeks 1-3)
- Team formation and social activities
- Technical setup
- Project selection
- Git & Github workshop
Project Sprints (Weeks 4-13)
- Three 3-week sprints
- Each sprint includes planning, development, and review
Final Phase (Week 14)
- Project completion
- Demo Day preparation and presentations

Sessions

Two weekly online sessions (Tuesday & Thursday, 19:00-21:00):

Brief updates in the main room (15 min)
Team breakout rooms for project work (90 min)
Regular check-ins with Guides

Team Structure

2-3 students per team (self-formed groups)
Focus on collaboration and peer learning
Regular guidance from volunteer mentors

Deliverables

Each sprint requires:

Code on GitHub
Documentation
Sprint presentation
Progress report

Activities Description

Work Time

This is where the students are working on their projects in class and the teachers are available to help.
We can encourage them to be investigating their tickets so that they can already start finding any unknowns that we can instruct them on, or to inform us what the next lesson should be about.
Pair with students, answer their questions
We do code reviews, look at their work, and see how we can be helping them improve as mentors.
Prepare the upcoming tickets for the next classes.

Standup

The PM of each team walks them through standup:

Check the status of the tasks on the board: Any updates, anything blocked or anyone need help?
Keep it brief - standups are about exchanging important information and connecting with people who can solve your problems, not about solving them there or showing off.

Planning

Roughly figuring out who will work on what for the rest of the week. Mainly looking for:
Does every student have meaningful work available to them?
Will anyone be blocked by others, and can we avoid that?

Demo

Give the students a chance in front of everyone to showcase what they’ve been working on and made, what they’re proud of.

Retro

At the end of every sprint, we’ll have a retrospective where we address two main points:

Likes: What did we like (about anything - the tasks, the project, the code, the course, other people?)
Wishes: What do we wish for, how could we make things better (about the tasks, or the project, the code, or the course).

Lesson

When we see students needing help on a specific topic (or they request a specific one), then the Instructor prepares a short (20m-1h) lesson on the topic. This should be a bit of a lecture with some slides or other visual materials, and ideally some examples and practice code/session for the students. We will record these lessons.

Best Practices

Project Management

Light agile ceremonies
GitHub for project tracking
Regular team check-ins

Support Activities

Stand-ups: Quick status updates and blocker identification
Planning: Ensure meaningful work distribution
Demos: Showcase progress
Retros: Review and improve process
Ad-hoc lessons on specific topics as needed

On-Site Activities

We are organizing on-site activities in our three main locations. Find out more below.

We invite you to four on-site community events throughout the semester if you are located in Berlin and the surrounding. The Onboarding will also take place in person in Berlin. You are more than welcome to join!

We invite you to four on-site community events throughout the semester if you are located in Berlin and surrounding. The Onboarding and Demo Day will also take place in person in Düsseldorf. You are more than welcome to join!

Four in-person sessions are taking place in Hamburg: Onboarding, two regular course sessions, and Demo Day. If you are based in Hamburg, it would be fantastic if you could support the course in one or more of these sessions.

Conclusion

We hope that by reading this, you have a better idea of the course and what it means to volunteer at ReDI. Let's explore the Timeline now 📅.