Career Guidance in AI/Data Science for a Student Who Appeared for IGCSE 10th Exams in March 2025

[Futureized]

Exploring Career Pathways in AI/Data Science After IGCSE (PCM/ICT/English)
Student has recently appeared for the IGCSE 10th exams in March 2025 from Mumbai, with subjects including Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics (PCM), ICT, and English. Considering a career in Artificial Intelligence or Data Science, we are currently evaluating the following post-IGCSE options:

1. JEE + Integrated College Program
2. MHT-CET + Integrated College Program
3. Post-12th: 4-Year B.Tech Program at Atlas University in Mumbai
4. Cambridge A Levels (11th and 12th)
   Note: A Levels appear most beneficial for students planning to pursue higher education abroad after 12th, based on current research and expert opinions.

Query:
Beyond these mainstream pathways, are there any additional viable options available for students with this academic background?

From the research conducted so far, the majority of students in similar situations seem to converge on two main routes: JEE or MHT-CET.

Given the long-term goal of building a career in AI/Data Science, what would be your best suggestions?

Also, if you’re aware of other students who are pursuing similar goals or considering alternative routes, their examples or guidance would be greatly appreciated.

 

[drumstick]

Hello i am a igcse board student i just finished my as levels but i have seen many of my friends suffer while studying for jee as they did not have enough time 2 years even other juniors who have been studying since grade 9 find it hard due to totally different syllabus and no calculator etc. so i would suggest trying sat exams and trying some uni which prefer sat exams. Also it would be better if they were to start learning the basics of computer science in as level along as it is much better that ict

 

[altair21]

Unless you want to be a "glorified" data muncher, there's zero scope in India for any core AI job and this is true for other countries as well, if you really want to get into core AI (which I doubt you want to), A-Levels/SATs/GRE is the way forward, if you can afford it, do well in SATs and build your career in USA, or if money is an issue, do B.Tech here, and then a MS and PHD from America/Europe.

I can expound more on it but I need more details on what exactly you are envisioning, because you might as well say I want to work with computers and build a career out of it for all the good it does. AI/Data Science are just buzz words thrown around willy nilly for non-tech folks.

 

[Futureized]

SATs/GRE is the way forward

Can you provide more information about this.

And any review for a B.Tech in AI from https://atlasuniversity.edu.in/

 

[altair21]

Can you provide more information about this.

SATs are kind of like Mains but for colleges in USA, similar process as in JEE but its more of a general aptitude test instead of something like JEE Advanced, you need a valid SAT score to apply for colleges in USA for B.S. (Bachelor of Science), GRE is similar to SATs but for graduate programs and is valid across US, Canada and some countries in Europe (not all afaik).

And any review for a B.Tech in AI from https://atlasuniversity.edu.in/

I wont suggest any AI crap degree from even IITs, specially from a no name not even deemed (from a cursory google search) university, all such universities will just scam you out of your money. Get a proper CS degree from a decent established private college like SRM/VIT (yes, these are decent) which have proven track record of placements, or at least have companies visiting their campuses (this honestly should be your #1 benchmark for any college you consider), even if you graduate from IITK/IITD/IISC, you will not be scoring any core AI job unless you consider building mind numbing statistical models AI, you need a MS/PHD for orgs to even consider you, Applied AI which is most likely what you are gunning for anyways is easier, but these days it mostly consists of LLM Prompting, maybe some embeddings, some trasfer learning, and thats about it.

My point is, don't consider AI as your future field, get a general CS degree which will give you a wholistic base as well as exposure to other fields in CS, then decide what you want to do, I was like this before
AI even became a buzzword, wanted to work training my models, applying research papers to real life problems and what not but reality is a lot different.

 

[b.life]

Hi,
Recently post regarding data science was made and I replied there and don't want to repeat it once again so linking to it.
Regarding AI, Artificial Intelligence can be loosely classified into knowledge acquisition(using techniques like neural networks to convert raw data into usable information) and decision systems(using the knowledge to perform actions, like object identification, robot control, logic analysis, etc). But these days running machine learning code written by someone is AI.

The optimal approach to making a good carrier in either AI or Data Science field, is to take a generic CSE degree from some good college and on the side
1. For carrier in data science field,
1.1 Study statistics, and probability, business analysis, R among other things.
1.2 Identify which domain they like to work in. Like Business, Medicine, Finance, Political Analysis, Market Research, etc and identify the tools used and start specializing in them.
1.3 Do 1.2, from Year 1 of college till Year 3, and for Year 3 & 4, start writing reports from publicly available data and send it to interested parties(for eg, do a market survey about furniture build a good report and send it to reliance/tata these companies has research teams that does real data analysis works). Most wont reply but some will and you can build connections.
1.4 When you are finishing college, talk with the companies/think tanks that replied and build on the connection and you will get a good position based on previous reports.
1.5 Market research, Political and Strategic Planning think tanks pay a lot for good analyst. But the entry criteria is difficult but as the student is only now starting college they have 4 years to develop the skill.

2. For Carrier in Artificial Intelligence,
2.1 Be very through in calculus, algebra, statistics, and probability, skip this and you will have problems latter.
2.2 Learn LISP, Prolog, they are not the cutting edge or anything but when you program in them you will understand logic and flow better than in other languages.
2.3 As AI is a vast field, you need to decide which field you like for example, vision, speech identification, robotics among others.
2.4 Learn to code from the ground up and not use existing software. For example not many can write a 3 layer neural network from scratch.
2.5 Do 2.1 till 2.4 for Year 1 till 3. From Year 3, start contributing to blogs, opensource projects. Also when you improve an existing procedure try writing to the companies that use them and you will be surprised how many actually respond. Do not skip making your efforts visible else it will be very hard to get any traction within the AI industry.
2.6 Sad state but the truth is market intelligence(people profiling) is the highest paying job(next to Geo-poltical analysis because of government money) in the market right now. This combines AI and Data Science and pays are very good.

AI industry within India is almost non existent but Data Science in form of Market Intelligence, Financial Risk Assessment, Credit Card Fraud Detection, Think Tanks exist. These are not run of the mill job that get advertised but mostly filled in house or foreign experts brought in to setup and maintained in house(most of the banks does that). Reliance and TATA group haired data analyst to comb through their retail data some 6/7 years go but then they have gone quite, either they have established a good team or brought in foreign tie ups. Think Tanks access to quality analyst are shit and it shows in many of the reports that are published here, so that is something to think about.

I too will second the conclusions drawn by @altair21 on Indian colleges, so done waste money on specialized courses instead select a computer science and engineering course that has Theory of computations, AI, Neural Networks and you will get a good basic understanding that will help build up your knowledge later.

Regards

 

[altair21]

Hi,
Recently post regarding data science was made and I replied there and don't want to repeat it once again so linking to it.
Regarding AI, Artificial Intelligence can be loosely classified into knowledge acquisition(using techniques like neural networks to convert raw data into usable information) and decision systems(using the knowledge to perform actions, like object identification, robot control, logic analysis, etc). But these days running machine learning code written by someone is AI.

The optimal approach to making a good carrier in either AI or Data Science field, is to take a generic CSE degree from some good college and on the side
1. For carrier in data science field,
1.1 Study statistics, and probability, business analysis, R among other things.
1.2 Identify which domain they like to work in. Like Business, Medicine, Finance, Political Analysis, Market Research, etc and identify the tools used and start specializing in them.
1.3 Do 1.2, from Year 1 of college till Year 3, and for Year 3 & 4, start writing reports from publicly available data and send it to interested parties(for eg, do a market survey about furniture build a good report and send it to reliance/tata these companies has research teams that does real data analysis works). Most wont reply but some will and you can build connections.
1.4 When you are finishing college, talk with the companies/think tanks that replied and build on the connection and you will get a good position based on previous reports.
1.5 Market research, Political and Strategic Planning think tanks pay a lot for good analyst. But the entry criteria is difficult but as the student is only now starting college they have 4 years to develop the skill.

2. For Carrier in Artificial Intelligence,
2.1 Be very through in calculus, algebra, statistics, and probability, skip this and you will have problems latter.
2.2 Learn LISP, Prolog, they are not the cutting edge or anything but when you program in them you will understand logic and flow better than in other languages.

bruh whats this AI garbage that you are copy pasting? you definitely dont need either LISP or Prolog for AI, and if you really want to learn the extreme basics, then C/C++ is your best bet, Is prolog even being used anywhere? same with Lisp? atleast fact check before you copy paste shit

 

[b.life]

bruh whats this AI garbage that you are copy pasting? you definitely dont need either LISP or Prolog for AI, and if you really want to learn the extreme basics, then C/C++ is your best bet, Is prolog even being used anywhere? same with Lisp? atleast fact check before you copy paste shit

1. I don't know what you understood in this "Learn LISP, Prolog, they are not the cutting edge or anything but when you program in them you will understand logic and flow better than in other languages."
1.1 But I stand by my words, Prolog is the best for writing logic programs, if the user is new to writing complex logic, they can easily do so.
1.2 If you don't even know where LISP is used today then I have nothing more to add here.
2. If you want to have a productive discussion the first step is to stop insulting others.
3. Since you cant seem to differentiate AI generated text from others, I have nothing more to say.
4. Sorry to @Futureized for derailing the thread with reply to the quoted author.

 

[altair21]

1. I don't know what you understood in this "Learn LISP, Prolog, they are not the cutting edge or anything but when you program in them you will understand logic and flow better than in other languages."

what exactly do you mean by "complex" logic? like you do know that Lisp is on its deathbed and that prolog is dead? you might as well recommend fortran, heh or at this point why not just use assembly? since that will help build your "logic"

1.1 But I stand by my words, Prolog is the best for writing logic programs, if the user is new to writing complex logic, they can easily do so.

my point above

1.2 If you don't even know where LISP is used today then I have nothing more to add here.

please enlighten me, and please dont mention decades old infra surviving on nothing but prayers and patchwork, or old researchers who are used to it and just wont change, hell, name me just one new (started in the last 10 years) project thats using Lisp

2. If you want to have a productive discussion the first step is to stop insulting others.

and I would if it wasnt blatantly clear that you are just copy pasting stuff without doing any research, if I wanted that I would stick to shitty medium articles or reddit. I love TE because peeps post what they know instead of just copy pasting rando AI generated crap

3. Since you cant seem to differentiate AI generated text from others, I have nothing more to say.
4. Sorry to @Futureized for derailing the thread with reply to the quoted author.