TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2013

TechCrunch Disrupt NY took place just a few weeks ago and it was amazing.

For more information on the speakers and the winners, click the following link:

TechCrunch Disrupt NY 2013

After three days of startup demos at TechCrunch Disrupt NY, data startup Enigma won both the Startup Battlefield and the Disrupt Cup, taking home $50,000 and beating out six other finalists.

Enigma aims to make sorting through public data a breeze. It pulls info from over 100,000 data sources and finds connections between them. Think SEC filing, state and federal records, lists of frozen assets and even CrunchBase.

Sure, the data is already out there, but it's not easily accessible. The founders also maintain that it's
hard to see the connections between those sources of public data.

It will be interesting to watch their success during the following year!

Mobile Health Without Borders- And More Stanford University Classes

Stanford University has just opened two more classes: "Mobile Health Without Borders" and "Sustainable Design and Product Management" and they both look incredibly interesting.

I have always been passionate about science, discovery, medicine, technology and how all four areas intersect and overlap. And that is why I am super excited about the Mobile Health Without Borders Class and I think you will be just as excite!

A course description of the Mobile Health Without Borders class is below:
"Today, more people have access to a mobile phone than to clean drinking water. At the same time, health systems around the world struggle to deliver cost-effective care. For example, where the United States confronts unsustainably soaring costs and millions of underserved citizens, Sub-Saharan Africa endeavours to provide medical care in the context of infrastructural challenges, economic shortfalls, and the highest disease burden in the world. Throughout India and China, investments in mobile entrepreneurship are reshaping how health care is delivered to massive populations. Meanwhile South America is experiencing a surge of entrepreneurial activity that promises to reshape how its citizens interact with the health system. To expose you to the breadth of activity and opportunity, each class will consist of multiple short presentations from renowned experts. Each lecture will be streamed live and a recorded copy will remain available on the course website through the duration of the course. Class discussions about these presentations will also take place online."

The course description for the Sustainable Design and Product Management course is below:

This course focuses on strategies and techniques for development of sustainable products and manufacturing processes. Using case studies, we will examine strategic decisions and best practices in new product and process development when environmental and resource externalities are accounted for.

Environmental sustainability has emerged as the imperative management undertaking for business sustainability in the face of rising global demand for natural resources and environment services and of environmental problems such as climate change. We will examine how regulatory and voluntary requirements for sustainable development affect the ability of a firm to achieve its business and corporate objectives. We will assess how sustainable products and operational practices contribute to the firm’s competitive advantage and operational efficiency and to enabling entrepreneurial opportunities.

Students will examine the industrial ecology and life cycle assessment techniques in integrating traditional product and process development requirements with those of the environment and society. 
The emphasis in this course is on sustainability requirements in management of new product and process development from the perspective of the senior-level executive who is responsible for the firm’s business and operational strategies. Student teams will develop a new sustainable product, or undertake field study projects to gain firsthand experience with sustainability practices in a company.

If you are interested in learning more about Stanford's Venture Lab or keen to sign up for a class yourself, simply click on the link below. Enjoy!

Stanford's Venture Lab

More Interesting Free Classes Available on Coursera!

If you haven't yet signed up for any online courses from any of the reputable institutions offering them (Stanford, Harvard, MIT, just to name a few), I wholeheartedly encourage you to consider taking a course through Coursera.  Coursera recently won "Best New Startup of 2012" from the Tech 2012 Crunchies. According to a Tech Crunch article, "Coursera has opened up access to proprietary content, with over 200 courses from over 33 top international and domestic schools like Stanford and Princeton, and is one of the bright points of light pointing towards value and job creation in the creative space."

While over two million students have at some point taken a Coursera course, there are still some controversies. For example, it remains to be seen whether the universities will continue to let Coursera proliferate with their intellectual property. And its main criticism is that the company currently has no clear way to monetize.

Click here to learn more about it:

Coursera


I recently signed up for "A Beginner's Guide to Irrational Behavior." It is taught by Dan Ariely of Duke University and the subject matter is something that I'm incredibly interested in. 

Beginner's Guide To Irrational Behavior

White House Science Fair

I am feeling very inspired as I read about the amazing and talented young group of students invited to the White House for their extraordinary science fair projects.

100 students from more than 40 state were invited to an all-day, hands-on celebration of the power and potential of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education.

As the President said in 2009, when he announced the first ever White House Science Fair: “If you win the NCAA championship, you come to the White House. Well, if you're a young person and you've produced the best experiment or design, the best hardware or software, you ought to be recognized for that achievement, too.”

That’s why young inventors of everything from portable windmills to oil-producing algae, and from underwater robots to dehydration-preventing football gear were invited to share their wares at all corners of the White House -- from the South Lawn to the State Dining Room -- for today's event. The cohort of kids included app-coders, rocket-builders, video-game designers, and city-planners—many of them, as the President pointed out, not yet old enough to drive. One team of innovators even helped the President hop onto a bike and test out their pedal-powered water filtration system.

It's amazing to read stories like these of young innovators using technology and design to create solutions to existing problems. However, whenever I learn about a student's mind blowing scientific or technological achievement, I cannot help but think of all the many other students who, because of an obstacle in financial resources/educational support/familiar support or something similar, were not able to reach their potential.

It is motivating to continue to use Studio C and all our collective resources to keep brainstorming ways to provide a strong foundation of STEM education to all students globally, regardless of economic background.

White House Science Fair

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation

I know I've posted about the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation before. But I would like to dedicate this blog post to their organization. They really are a fantastic organization.

I've copied and pasted a letter that Bill and Melinda have written on their website describing their organization:

Letter from Bill and Melinda Gates

"Our friend and co-trustee Warren Buffett once gave us some great advice about philanthropy: “Don’t just go for safe projects,” he said. “Take on the really tough problems.”

We couldn’t agree more. Our foundation is teaming up with partners around the world to take on some tough challenges: extreme poverty and poor health in developing countries, and the failures of America’s education system. We focus on only a few issues because we think that’s the best way to have great impact, and we focus on these issues in particular because we think they are the biggest barriers that prevent people from making the most of their lives.

For each issue we work on, we fund innovative ideas that could help remove these barriers: new techniques to help farmers in developing countries grow more food and earn more money; new tools to prevent and treat deadly diseases; new methods to help students and teachers in the classroom. Some of the projects we fund will fail. We not only accept that, we expect it—because we think an essential role of philanthropy is to make bets on promising solutions that governments and businesses can’t afford to make. As we learn which bets pay off, we have to adjust our strategies and share the results so everyone can benefit.

We’re both optimists. We believe by doing these things—focusing on a few big goals and working with our partners on innovative solutions—we can help every person get the chance to live a healthy, productive life."

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I love the line from the letter that reads "Don't just go for safe projects. Take on the really tough problems."

Another fantastic thing about the Gates Foundation is that they try different solutions to address various global problems, learn which strategies work best and then they SHARE the results so that everyone can benefit. I believe it is critical and absolutely necessary to share results, insights, findings, etc. with everyone. Working together, and allowing everyone equal and free access to the same information is vital to moving forward and alleviating some of these global issues.

A Few Inspiring TED Talks About Schools And Education

One of my favorite things to do when I have some free time is to browse through the TED website and watch a few videos. The TED conference, which stands for Technology, Education and Design, is a global set of conferences that was created to disseminate 'ideas worth spreading."

TED's mission statement begins:

We believe passionately in the power of ideas to change attitudes, lives and ultimately, the world. So we're building here a clearinghouse that offers free knowledge and inspiration from the world's most inspired thinkers, and also a community of curious souls to engage with ideas and each other.

A recent favorite TED video is a talk by Richard Turere, a 13 year old boy from Kenya, who invented "lion lights" to protect his family's cattle from lion attacks. Richard discusses how he created the solar-powered solution and his passion for this project is inspiring. Click below to watch the full video:

Richard Turere: My inventions that made peace with lions


Another recent talk I watched and recommend is by a young woman named Kakenya Ntaiya from Kenya. Kakenya made a deal with her father: She would undergo the traditional Maasai rite of passage of female circumcision if he would let her go to high school. Ntaiya tells the fearless story of continuing on to college, and of working with her village elders to build a school for girls in her community. It’s the educational journey of one that altered the destiny of 125 young women.  Click below to watch the full video.

Kakenya Ntaiya: A girl who demanded a school


Watching these videos are so inspiring. Particularly inspiring is that these are young students, with extremely limited resources. These particular kids, Richard and Kakenya, come from impoverished backgrounds and were still able to make a substantial, innovative, meaningful change to their communities. I am so impressed with them, and so grateful that they were able to share their story through TED talks.

More about TED:

The TED organization addresses a wide range of topics within the research and practice of science and culture, often through storytelling. The speakers spend about 20 minutes presenting their ideas in the most innovative and engaging ways they can. Past presenters include Bill Clinton, Jane Goodall, Malcolm Gladwell, Al Gore, Gordon Brown, Bill Gates,Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, and many Nobel Prize winners. 

Since June 2006, the talks have been offered for free viewing online. As of November 2011, over 1,050 talks are available free online.By January 2009 they had been viewed 50 million times. In June 2011, the viewing figure stood at more than 500 million, and on Tuesday November 13, 2012, TED Talks had been watched one billion times worldwide, reflecting a still growing global audience.

X PRIZE Foundation

The X PRIZE Foundation is a non-profit organization that designs and manages public competitions intended to encourage technological development that could benefit mankind.

From Wikipedia: "It's mission is to bring about “radical breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity” through incentivized competition. It fosters high-profile competitions that motivate individuals, companies and organizations across all disciplines to develop innovative ideas and technologies that help solve the grand challenges that restrict humanity’s progress."

I first heard of the X PRIZE several years ago and was completely fascinated with their competitions. They have four main categories for competition:

1. Energy and Environment Prize Group
The goal of the Energy & Environment Prize Group is to generate breakthroughs in clean energy, climate change, energy distribution/storage, energy efficiency/use, and water resource management. Advances in these fields will lead to greater sustainability and efficiency, while reducing our dependence on fossil fuels.

2. Exploration Prize Grou
The goal of the Exploration Prize Group is to expand the use of space, the ocean and other unexplored frontiers in order to improve life on Earth and extend life beyond the confines of land. We believe we can achieve these objectives by researching space and Earth's oceans, accessing and conserving their resources, catalyzing private, non-governmental activity, and tapping into our innate wonder about the Earth, the Universe and our place within each.

3. Education and Global Development Prize Group (my favorite!)
The goal of the Education and Global Development Prize Group is to develop new and innovative ways to address major challenges in agriculture, capital, education, health and water. The competitions seek to highlight the most scalable enterprises that create wealth and uplift entire populations from poverty.

4. Life Science Prize Group 
The goal of the Life Sciences Prize Group is to stimulate innovative breakthroughs in molecular biology, stem cell research, bionics, organogenesis, synthetic biology, and artificial intelligence in order to improve health care and extend healthy living. The X PRIZE Foundation looks to accelerate the real-world impact of science, technology, and information related to the worldwide optimization of health and the elimination of illness and disease.

You can read about what projects are in development and what projects are currently under consideration. My favorites include a global literacy project, a girls education project, a clean water initiative, and the organogenesis and rare disease projects. 

For more information, or to read more about these projects, check out their website: 
X PRIZE FOUNDATION 

Clearly, the X PRIZE Foundation is an amazing organization and they've had much success over the years. I love that they are trying to tackle the world's greatest problems by creating and managing large-scale, high-profile, incentivized prize competitions that stimulate investment in research and development.  They really are motivating and inspiring brilliant innovators from all disciplines to leverage their intellectual and financial capital.

However, I think we can do more. How come the X PRIZE isn't a household name? Why don't high school students know about it? I feel that right now, only a small percentage of the population knows about the X PRIZE and that is a weakness. Why isn't X PRIZE marketed the way APPLE or NIKE is advertised? Think of the potential talent they could attract if more people were aware of the projects and competitions and the prize money! I just believe that if we are truly trying to solve the world's problems with innovative thinking and breakthrough technology, we need everyone who might be interested in pursuing that goal on board. At the very least, we need them to be aware of organizations like this, so that they can make contact, get inspired, start their projects and contribute. At the very least, they would be working towards a noble goal and that is a beautiful thing.

21 Winners of The Facebook/Gates Foundation Education App Contest!

Back in September, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation launched a contest that aimed to challenge entrepreneurs and app developers to build awesome, innovative education apps on Facebook’s platform. The so-called College Knowledge Challenge kicked off with an EdTech hackathon co-hosted by the Gates Foundation and Facebook, located at the social network’s headquarters in Menlo Park.

As Josh Constine has noted, "The contest called on developers of all ages to create apps that “build pathways to college, build peer groups for in-coming college students and assist with college admission and securing financial aid.”

Some of my favorites from the winners list are listed below with a brief description. A link to the full article is at the end of this post.

Favorites:


1. "I'm First by The Center for Student Opportunity"
Center for Student Opportunity (CSO) is a national nonprofit empowering first-generation college students on the path to and through college. The organization’s project aims to collect pledges and stories from first-generation college graduates to inspire the next generation of students who will be first. The I’m First web app features tools and resources to help aspiring first-generation college students and their supporters take the steps necessary to pursue and succeed in college.


2. "What's Your Road by Roadtrip Nation"
Roadtrip Nation started in 2001 when a group of friends took a Roadtrip with this simple idea: Talk to people who do what they love, and you’ll get a better understanding of how to build a life you love. What started as a Roadtrip sparked a documentary series, live campus events, a video archive of hundreds of interviews and, most recently, curricula and resources to help at-risk students in disadvantaged communities gain access and exposure to life pathways. Roadtrip Nation’s latest endeavor, “What’s Your Road?” is a virtual roadtrip experience (in Facebook) where youth explore pathways aligned with their aspirations and connect with mentors in those fields.


3. "Applyful"- 
Currently in private beta, Applyful is a collaborative college selection platform, designed for college applicants to collect and share information with one another on the road to choosing a college. As applicants use Applyful to manage research during the application process, Applyful surfaces trends and insights to encourage more informed decision-making, while developing peer groups to offer support and interaction.


Read more about the contest and the other winners here:

Techcrunch- 21 Winners of the Gates Foundation/Facebook Education App Contest

NuVu: Where High School Students Are Taught Creativity And Innovation

The MIT media lab is one of the most innovative, original, risk taking labs out there today.
I check into their website at least every 2 weeks to see their latest research and findings
and am always impressed.

Also at MIT is something amazing called NuVu. It's basically an innovation center for middle and high school students. They have classes and projects entitled "Futuristic Musical Instruments," "Brainwave Art and Music," "Interactive Storybook," and "Drawing Robots."

The link to the official site is below:
NuVu- MIT


A brief description is below:
NuVu is a full-time magnet innovation center for middle and high school students and a professional development program for teachers and educators. NuVu’s pedagogy is based on the architectural studio model and geared around multi-disciplinary, collaborative projects. Established in the Fall of 2010 in Cambridge, MA, NuVu provides students the opportunity to work collaboratively with experts, PhDs and alumni from MIT and Harvard as well as working professionals, to solve real-world problems in an intensive and fun studio environment. For teachers and educators, NuVu provides training on how to bring innovative practices to students’ learning using project-based methods. NuVu nurtures creative problem solving, team collaboration across networks, communication and presentation skills, systems thinking, adaptability, risk-taking and imagination, all critical for student success.

AND some awesome articles describing what exactly happens at NuVu are below:
NuVu Article 1

and
NuVu Article 2

Google Science Fair!

Growing up, I was an avid fan of science and participated in numerous science fairs, winning first place at a few of them and competing in the Intel Science Talent Search competition.

I first heard about the Google Science Fair after reading an article on the official Google Blog and became intrigued. I then spent several hours reading about the innovative research and projects that current high school students were conducting and was simply blown away.

Students today are combining science and technology to come up with creative and effective solutions to some of the world's most pressing problems and it's incredibly inspiring.

I encourage you to read about Birttany Wenger's research that resulted in her developing an app to help doctors diagnose breast cancer. (Brittany Wenger, a 17 year old, was the Grand Prize winner in 2012). 

Global Neural Network Cloud Service for Breast Cancer

And for more information about the 2013 Google Science Fair, check out the link below:

Google Science Fair 2013

Khan Academy

The Khan Academy is a website that everyone should visit at least once.

Khan Academy is a non profit educational website created in 2006 by Salman Khan, a graduate of MIT and Harvard Business School. In 2010, Khan Academy received significant grants from Google (2 million) and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (1.5 million) and has really expanded upon their site, showing vast improvements in the last year alone.

While I don't personally think online education can replace classroom learning, Khan Academy certainly enhances traditional classroom learning and allows students to keep learning outside the classroom. What I love about this video-based learning site is that the learner can go at his or her own pace, re-watch videos or pause them to think through an idea. Khan Academy also keeps the actual videos frills-free and the material approachable. If you are a student, parent, or just a life-long learner, I'm confident that Khan Academy has something to offer you.

Khan Academy

Links to Open Courseware Sites From Top US Universities

One of my greatest accomplishments is attending Northwestern University and taking challenging, interesting, amazing classes taught by first class professors. I'll be honest, I learned as much outside of the classroom as I did in the classroom, but attending college was the first time I really felt intellectually stimulated and challenged. (High school was great, I studied hard and I learned a lot but I also felt as if I wasn't necessarily being challenged enough despite taking all honors and AP classes and graduating in the top 10% of my class).

A few years ago, I discovered Open Courseware sites. I think I was reading an article that had a link to the Yale Open Courseware site and I was intrigued. I logged on and took an "Introduction to Psychology" class and thoroughly enjoyed it. The course lectures and readings were the same materials that Yale students were exposed to yet I could go through the course at my own pace and on my own time. I was hooked! I then took a few other courses as well as some at Stanford University. Many top universities are now offering free online courses of their already established classes and it's a wonderful thing. The best part is that anyone can take these free online classes! 

The course selection is varied and I believe there is something for everyone.

I love the idea that a small girl growing up in rural india with limited educational opportunities due to coming from a low socio-economic background can now learn about Computer Science and Programming (MIT), Biotechnology (MIT), World Literature (Yale or MIT) or Entrepreneurship (Stanford).

The world is changing fast, and technology is aiding the process. I strongly believe in open access to top rate education and a more level playing field. And these Open Courseware sites are a step in the right direction. Just think of how some little girl or little boy's life might change with exposure to higher level/first- rate academics. For someone who might live in an environment with limited resources and where education is not a priority, this could really motivate them and change their life path. At the very least, they will learn something new and a more educated society benefits all.

Here are links to some of the more popular Open Courseware sites:

1. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
MIT

2. Stanford University
Stanford
Stanford Venture Lab

3. Yale University
Yale

4. Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon

4. Harvard University
Harvard

Enjoy!

Fascinating Article About The Income Achievement Gap

The Reproduction of Privilege

By Thomas Edsall, New York Times, March 12, 2012

Excerpt #1:

"As the value of a college degree has nearly doubled, in terms of future earnings, the percentage of low income college students actually graduating by age 24 has grown by only 2.1 points, from 6.2 percent in 1970 to 8.3 percent in 2009. Among students from families in the highest income quartile, the graduation rate by age 24 has surged by 42.2 percentage points, doubling from 40.2 percent to 82.4 percent over the last four decades.......

Excerpt #2: 

There is a substantial body of evidence that the system is failing to reward students with high test scores who come from low-income families. In a 2005 report, the College Board found that among those scoring highest in math tests in 1992, just under three-quarters of students from families in the highest quartile went on to get bachelor’s degrees by the year 2000. Among those from families in the bottom quartile, less than half that number, 29 percent, went on to get degrees.

Excerpt #3:

“The income-achievement gap is now more than twice as large as the black-white achievement gap. Fifty years ago, in contrast, the black-white gap was twice as large as the income gap,” according to Sean Reardon, a professor of education and sociology at Stanford, writing in “The Widening Academic Achievement Gap between the Rich and the Poor: New Evidence and Possible Explanations:”

At the same time that family income has become more predictive of children’s academic achievement, so have educational attainment and cognitive skills become more predictive of adults’ earnings. The combination of these trends creates a feedback mechanism that may decrease intergenerational mobility. As the children of the rich do better in school, and those who do better in school are more likely to become rich, we risk producing an even more unequal and economically polarized society.