Enhance your skills with SAS Visual Forecasting

Offered By

Analyzing Time Series and Sequential Data SpecializationSAS

About this Specialization

Using SAS Visual Forecasting and other SAS tools, you will learn to explore time series, create and select features, build and manage a large-scale forecasting system, and use a variety of models to identify, estimate and forecast signal components of interest.

Applied Learning Project

In this specialization’s project, learners will discover signal components in high value series then specify custom specifications appropriate for these series. These custom specifications are incorporated into a large scale forecasting system that learners create to automate the process of model generation, model selection and forecasting. Learners accommodate recurrent events and anomalies in the process generating the data to refine the automatic forecasting system .

Shareable Certificate

Earn a Certificate upon completion

100% online courses

Start instantly and learn at your own schedule.

Flexible Schedule

Set and maintain flexible deadlines.

Intermediate Level

Comfortability with basic statistical concepts from Statistics with SAS. Familiarity with matrices and principal components analysis is helpful.

Approximately 7 months to complete

Suggested pace of 1 hour/week

English

Subtitles: English

Shareable Certificate

Earn a Certificate upon completion

100% online courses

Start instantly and learn at your own schedule.

Flexible Schedule

Set and maintain flexible deadlines.

Intermediate Level

Comfortability with basic statistical concepts from Statistics with SAS. Familiarity with matrices and principal components analysis is helpful.

Approximately 7 months to complete

Suggested pace of 1 hour/week

English

Subtitles: English

How the Specialization Works

Take Courses

A Coursera Specialization is a series of courses that helps you master a skill. To begin, enroll in the Specialization directly, or review its courses and choose the one you'd like to start with. When you subscribe to a course that is part of a Specialization, you’re automatically subscribed to the full Specialization. It’s okay to complete just one course — you can pause your learning or end your subscription at any time. Visit your learner dashboard to track your course enrollments and your progress.

Hands-on Project

Every Specialization includes a hands-on project. You'll need to successfully finish the project(s) to complete the Specialization and earn your certificate. If the Specialization includes a separate course for the hands-on project, you'll need to finish each of the other courses before you can start it.

Earn a Certificate

When you finish every course and complete the hands-on project, you'll earn a Certificate that you can share with prospective employers and your professional network.

There are 3 Courses in this Specialization

Course1

Course 1

Creating Features for Time Series Data

This course focuses on data exploration, feature creation, and feature selection for time sequences. The topics discussed include binning, smoothing, transformations, and data set operations for time series, spectral analysis, singular spectrum analysis, distance measures, and motif analysis.

In this course you learn to perform motif analysis and implement analyses in the spectral or frequency domain. You also discover how distance measures work, implement applications, explore signal components, and create time series features. This course is appropriate for analysts with a quantitative background as well as domain experts who would like to augment their time-series tool box. Before taking this course, you should be comfortable with basic statistical concepts. You can gain this experience by completing the Statistics with SAS course. Familiarity with matrices and principal component analysis are also helpful but not required.

Course2

Course 2

Building a Large-Scale, Automated Forecasting System

In this course you learn to develop and maintain a large-scale forecasting project using SAS Visual Forecasting tools. Emphasis is initially on selecting appropriate methods for data creation and variable transformations, model generation, and model selection. Then you learn how to improve overall baseline forecasting performance by modifying default processes in the system.

This course is appropriate for analysts interested in augmenting their machine learning skills with analysis tools that are appropriate for assaying, modifying, modeling, forecasting, and managing data that consist of variables that are collected over time. The courses is primarily syntax based, so analysts taking this course need some familiarity with coding. Experience with an object-oriented language is helpful, as is familiarity with manipulating large tables.

Course3

Course 3

Modeling Time Series and Sequential Data

In this course you learn to build, refine, extrapolate, and, in some cases, interpret models designed for a single, sequential series. There are three modeling approaches presented. The traditional, Box-Jenkins approach for modeling time series is covered in the first part of the course. This presentation moves students from models for stationary data, or ARMA, to models for trend and seasonality, ARIMA, and concludes with information about specifying transfer function components in an ARIMAX, or time series regression, model. A Bayesian approach to modeling time series is considered next. The basic Bayesian framework is extended to accommodate autoregressive variation in the data as well as dynamic input variable effects. Machine learning algorithms for time series is the third approach. Gradient boosting and recurrent neural network algorithms are particularly well suited for accommodating nonlinear relationships in the data. Examples are provided to build intuition on the effective use of these algorithms.

The course concludes by considering how forecasting precision can be improved by combining the strengths of the different approaches. The final lesson includes demonstrations on creating combined (or ensemble) and hybrid model forecasts. This course is appropriate for analysts interested in augmenting their machine learning skills with analysis tools that are appropriate for assaying, modifying, modeling, forecasting, and managing data that consist of variables that are collected over time. This course uses a variety of different software tools. Familiarity with Base SAS, SAS/ETS, SAS/STAT, and SAS Visual Forecasting, as well as open-source tools for sequential data handling and modeling, is helpful but not required. The lessons on Bayesian analysis and machine learning models assume some prior knowledge of these topics. One way that students can acquire this background is by completing these SAS Education courses: Bayesian Analyses Using SAS and Machine Learning Using SAS Viya.

Instructors

Offered by

SAS

Through innovative software and services, SAS empowers and inspires customers around the world to transform data into intelligence. SAS is a trusted analytics powerhouse for organizations seeking immediate value from their data. A deep bench of analytics solutions and broad industry knowledge keep our customers coming back and feeling confident. With SAS®, you can discover insights from your data and make sense of it all. Identify what’s working and fix what isn’t. Make more intelligent decisions. And drive relevant change.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the refund policy?
If you subscribed, you get a 7-day free trial during which you can cancel at no penalty. After that, we don’t give refunds, but you can cancel your subscription at any time. See our full refund policy.
Can I just enroll in a single course?
Yes! To get started, click the course card that interests you and enroll. You can enroll and complete the course to earn a shareable certificate, or you can audit it to view the course materials for free. When you subscribe to a course that is part of a Specialization, you’re automatically subscribed to the full Specialization. Visit your learner dashboard to track your progress.
Is financial aid available?
Yes. In select learning programs, you can apply for financial aid or a scholarship if you can’t afford the enrollment fee. If fin aid or scholarship is available for your learning program selection, you’ll find a link to apply on the description page.
Can I take the course for free?
When you enroll in the course, you get access to all of the courses in the Specialization, and you earn a certificate when you complete the work. If you only want to read and view the course content, you can audit the course for free. If you cannot afford the fee, you can apply for financial aid.
Is this course really 100% online? Do I need to attend any classes in person?
This course is completely online, so there’s no need to show up to a classroom in person. You can access your lectures, readings and assignments anytime and anywhere via the web or your mobile device.
How long does it take to complete the Specialization?
Approximately 8 weeks
What background knowledge is necessary?
Before coming to the class, you should be comfortable with basic statistical concepts. You can gain this experience by completing Statistics with SAS. A familiarity with matrices and principal components analysis will also be helpful but is not required.
Do I need to take the courses in a specific order?
We recommend taking in this order:
Time Series Feature Mining & Creation
Large Scale Forecasting
Models for Time Series & Sequential Data
Will I earn university credit for completing the Specialization?
No
What will I be able to do upon completing the Specialization?
By the end of this specialization, learners will have completed 3 projects on time series data that develop skills in assaying, manipulating and modeling time series data that are relevant in large scale applications.

More questions? Visit the Learner Help Center.

Analyzing Time Series and Sequential Data Specialization

About this Specialization

Applied Learning Project