Education 2.0

We do believe that most of the problems in the world are deeply rooted in a lack of education.

We have posted in the past about our concerns about the sustainability of the current post-secondary education system.  In the last 15 years technology has radically changed our society & the business world.  We may be at the start of technology fundamentally changing the way education is delivered,  so we thought we would share some neat sites, articles and reports on these issues.

Khan Acadmey –  Is a library of over 3,000 free videos covering subjects from chemistry, physics, finance and history. This non-profit educational organization was  started by a graduate of MIT and Harvard Business school posting video’s on You-Tube to teach a family member.  They are using this material at my kids middle school.  The website is www.khanacademy.org.

Coursera – Great article by Thomas Friedman in the NY Times about a Stanford professor that co-founded this online education company.  He normally teaches 400 students per year, but reached 100,000 last semester in an online course.  The website is www.coursera.org.

In addition, 60 Minutes reported on an outside the box solution from billionaire Peter Thiel.  Students with promising ideas are paid $100,000 to drop out of college and become entrepreneurs.

I can hear Bob Dylan singing now “For the times they are a-changin’.”