Python has become the dominant programming language used in data science. Programming is the process of designing and building an executable computer programme for accomplishing a specific computational task.

The course will introduce you to programming with Python, which is currently one of the most popular programming languages in (data) science. After familiarization with the basics (input and output, variables, data types, data structures, conditional branching, loops, functions, etc.) the course will address specific data science topics, such as statistical analyses with the pandas package and data visualization with matplotlib.

Every day, short lectures will be combined with practicals, where students can practice with example datasets that will vary over the course of the week. In the afternoon, students choose to work in small project groups on applying the lessons of the day to a real-life dataset or work on their own individual project and additional exercises. Students will get on-location guidance from the tutors of the course while they are working on their projects.

This course starts at the very basics and is explicitly intended for students who have no or only little programming experience.

Data Science specialisation
This course can be taken separately, but is also part of a series of eight courses in the Summer School Data Science specialisation taught by UU’s department of Methodology & Statistics:

1. Data Science: Programming with Python (This course)
2. Data Science: Network Science (Course code S37, 7-11 July 2025)
3. Data Science: Statistical Programming with R (Course code S24, 14-18 July 2025)
4. Data Science: Applied Text Mining (Course code S42, 14-18 July 2025)
5. Data Science: Machine Learning with Python (Course code S70, 21-25 July 2025)
6. Data Science: Advanced Techniques for Handling Missing Data (Course code S28, 2026)
7. Data Science: Data Analysis (Course code S31, 2026)
8. Data Science: Text Mining with R (Course code S41,2026)