Introductory Courses for Anything You Want to Learn in 2025
Government • 5 min read
Individual Course
Introduction to Probability
Course Length
10 weeks
5-10 hours per week
Featuring faculty from:
Harvard Faculty of Arts & Sciences
Enroll as Individual
Certificate Price:
$ 209
Enroll as Individual
Certificate Price:
$ 209
Get the tools you need to understand data, science, philosophy, engineering, economics, and finance.
Probability and statistics help to bring logic to a world replete with randomness and uncertainty. This course will give you the tools needed to understand data, science, philosophy, engineering, economics, and finance. You will learn not only how to solve challenging technical problems, but also how you can apply those solutions in everyday life. With examples ranging from medical testing to sports prediction, you will gain a strong foundation for the study of statistical inference, stochastic processes, randomized algorithms, and other subjects where probability is needed. The course will be delivered via edX and connect learners around the world.
Self-Guided
edX
- Learning Outcome
Learn how to think about uncertainty and randomness.
- Learning Outcome
Understand how to make good predictions.
- Learning Outcome
Explore common probability distributions used in statistics and data science.
- Learn from Harvard faculty
- Do it on your own time
- Get a certificate, add it to your resume
- Be part of the Harvard Community
Ways to take this course
Audit or Pursue a Verified Certificate
A Verified Certificate costs $209 and provides unlimited access to full course materials, activities, tests, and forums. At the end of the course, learners who earn a passing grade can receive a certificate.
Alternatively, learners can Audit the course for free and have access to select course material, activities, tests, and forums. Please note that this track does not offer a certificate for learners who earn a passing grade.
Faculty
Your Instructor
Joe Blitzstein
Professor of the Practice in Statistics, Harvard University
Professor of the Practice in Statistics, Harvard University Joe Blitzstein is Professor of the Practice in Statistics at Harvard University, where has taught since 2006, after completing his Ph.D. in Mathematics (with a masters in Statistics) at Stanford University, advised by Persi Diaconis. He is originally from Los Angeles, California, and did his undergraduate studies in Mathematics at the California Institute of Technology. At Harvard, he has taught a wide range of undergraduate and graduate probability and statistics courses, including the popular statistics class Stat 110, which provides a comprehensive introduction to probability as a language and framework that can be applied wherever there is data, randomness, or uncertainty. Stat 110 has grown to over 500 on campus students per year at Harvard. With Professor Hanspeter Pfister from Computer Science, Joe also launched Harvard's first course in data science in 2013. Joe’s main research interests are in statistical inference for networks, “big data”, and other complex data structures.
Stay tuned for more
Don’t miss a thing. Subscribe to our newsletter and get updates on exclusive content for Harvard Online learners.
Related Blogs
- Introductory Courses for Anything You Want to Learn in 2025