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Tiffany Tay can crunch numbers, which she proved early in her career as a Certified Public Accountant.

After graduating from the University of Texas at Austin in the United States, she headed to New York for an accounting and tax consulting position at PwC. Before long, Tiffany discovered a new talent.

“I found that one of my strong points was optimizing processes, making things more efficient, as well as analyzing data,” she says. “So, I was interested in data science because that felt like a valuable complementary addition to the education that I had before.”

Tiffany saw a chance to grow while doing landscaping one day at her home in New York. She was listening to a data science podcast and heard the host mention free online academic offerings at WorldQuant University. Tiffany was intrigued but skeptical.

“What’s the catch?” she wondered.

Her research showed that WQU is legitimate, so she enrolled in the Applied Data Science Lab, a 16-week certificate program that Tiffany completed in 2025. She describes the program as “stellar.”

“I was very impressed by the quality of the Applied Data Science Lab, particularly the lectures within it,” she says. “It’s actually very doable because they’re all in small chunks, and you can work at your own pace.”

Tiffany also appreciated the support she received from her instructors and classmates.

“If you think the subject matter is over your head, then there are people there to help you,” she says. “The instructors have online office hours regularly. That’s another thing that impressed me. You could always join the office hours and get your questions answered. They even have a forum for each project, so you can go and search for questions that other students had and see what answers they received.”

Now Tiffany is ready for the next phase of her career.

“Looking ahead,” she says, “I’m focused on deepening my expertise in nonprofit operations management and impact measurement.”

Watch on YouTube

• Tiffany Tay: "Another Step Up" (1:51)
• Applied Data Science Lab (0:57)
• Free Education, No Catch (1:04)