This could trigger a question on many curious minds “Why do I need to go to real college then ?“.  A question, I have been pondering for a while in a different format “What is the value add of a college/school in the era where you have almost everything available on web, free or paid ?”

Answer is “World works on relationships and there are no better alternatives to learn, experience and make them work for you, than going to meet and interact with real people”. You can learn whatever you want over internet, but most important things you need to be able to successful in your professional and personal lives is your Human Skills. This is true even in the digital age, where we have luxury to send a tweet to president or Skype with someone across the ocean. At the end of the day, normal human being, use these tools to influence his social circle.

Even if MIT had announced that, their online certificate is of same value as that of their real classroom diploma ( they won’t, as it doesn’t make sense from business point of view), folks who would attend their original classroom would turn out to be much more successful than those who just took same classes just online.

Why is it that a person graduating from Harvard or MIT gets much more success than a person who is much more brilliant but just could not attend one of these well known college? Its all about network and things you learn when you deal with real human being. That is what you need when you enter into a real world. No doubt that you need to be smart, but I have seen much smarter people who could not make it because (a) they don’t know right people or people who would know right people or (b) they don’t have human skills to make it work for themselves.

Opening up courses online would democratize education, and many education institutes would need to redefine the way they currently impart education. There is and will be, much better course content, explanation available online and education provider would need to focus on other side of the success equation, i.e. impart more of Human Skills.

Focus on Human skills, real world exposure in a controlled environment and strong alumni network is what is going to make a college successful than others across the street.

Overall, I welcome this move from MIT and encourage students to think about the value a brick and mortar college can impart in their lives.

I am proud to introduce FounderWise a unique institute for founders in the Seattle/northwest USA to learn from the best of the breed CEOs and VCs who have gone through it and have taken the real challenge.

Below are details from mailer:

The Founder Institute ( http://www.founderinstitute.com) is a four month training program for both new and seasoned entrepreneurs. The Institute prepares founders to lead the next generation of world-class technology companies across a wide range industries, from the biotech to the internet. Weekly company-building sessions are guided by experienced CEOs, and they are held in the evening to allow participants to keep their day job or develop their companies during business hours. All of the program stakeholders, from the participating founders to the experienced CEO Mentors, share in the upside generated by the companies formed during the program. Participants also enjoy free services from more than three dozen Institute Partners, fundraising opportunities at fair market value, and a teamwork-oriented environment to build a company.

Sound good?  Potential Founders (students) interested in the Seattle winter semester of the Founder Institute can apply at http://www.founderinstitute.com/apply/5. Early Admissions Close on November 12, 2009, regular admissions are due by November 27, 2009.

Want to learn more about the Founder Institute program in the Seattle area?  Come to a special informational evening at the Boeing Auditorium on the University of Washington campus on the evening of November 2nd, 2009, hosted by the UW Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Registration for the free event is available at http://founderwise.com/events/.

FounderWise (http://www.founderinstitute.com) was launched to operate the Institute in Seattle and to be a founder-centric resource for simplifying the process of founding a successful startup, focusing on training entrepreneurs and establishing an extensive library of original and compiled startup resources.

Technorati Tags: founderwise,startup,seattle

What can help startups is, their relationship with people in the ecosystem.

Just as an example, One of the most talked about topic between wannapreneurs ( individuals who wants to be entrepreneurs) is how to reach a Venture Capitalist. Many a times this thought gets into head and mess everything up even before individual has actually thought through the product/company he/she wants to make. This is beautifully captured in this post How to approach VC

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Its like dream come true, when you get you meet in-person with individual like Dr APJ Abdul Kalam… In old northern Indian style..”..ganga naha liye..”

TIE Seattle had recently organized Dr. Kalam’s talk which I get to attend as well.

Introduced by Bill Gates Sr. , Dr. Kalam talked briefly about various talks he has given in his current trip which included trip to Boeing, University of Washington and talked about his Vision 2020 and how entrepreneurs and NRIs can contribute in it. He shared some great leadership examples he learnt and observed in his life.

This followed by a Q/A session which was like a classroom scene, where students where amongst the industry leaders/veterans in Seattle and teacher was Dr. Kalam . In his typical style, Dr. Kalam asked all of us to recite some lines after him and later asked..if its hard to follow the mantra in our life.

Talk was inspiring and many a times humorous as well.

I even get to meet him in person! which in gamer’s language would be *Another achievement unlocked*

I liked Academic Earth’s layout but given that youtube already have huge user base and deep pockets, I am sure they can change the game.

World seems to have changed a lot, thanks to internet.

I found this interesting site today http://academicearth.org/ thanks to TechCrunch, which hosts loads of free to watch video lectures from subject matter experts. Astronomy, Engineering, Computer Science, Political Science..you name it.

Its such a great resource for faculties. Its a great resource tool for them to explain concepts. Just grab that not so much used auditorium and play these videos.

Sounds fun and productive.