Comments on: Do tech stars need a degree? MIT’s Ito says yes, puts sponsor money where his mouth is

By: Don Park

Don Park — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 02:55:40 +0000

This is pretty cool but more interesting would be a program that allows corporate sponsors to direct what sponsored students learn to fit their needs, customizing or grooming future hires if you will. One potential problem with such a program is with allowing corporate sponsors access to school databases, raising privacy issues.

By: JD

JD — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 00:27:05 +0000

Bill Gates, Mark Z, Steve Jobs, Larry Ellison and Howard Huges….all drop outs…..is it the person or the environment? Plus imagine the court cases on any of these guys? It just takes a single precedent to invalidate this system. Given enough money on the table this will get quickly dismantled.

By: H. Murchison

H. Murchison — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 19:34:46 +0000

LOL here we go again with the “you need school”. Paying back school loans is tough enough but now you got VC that want to grab a lien on your future earnings as well? Steve is spot on this is Indentured Servitude 2.0. Couldn’t have said it better.

Anyone with the brainpower to get into a MIT or Cal Tech or other prestigious institute of higher learning is there for the contacts.

Paul brings up a great analogy. Do we expect kids that are ready for the Professional leagues to stick around and lose valuable years.

I think the need for higher education in the country is on the decline. If you got the smarts and the ability to network and get around the right people you can make things happen. And that really is in the spirit of America. This country rewards people who do smart things in and outside of the classroom. The trick is finding your niche and making something happen.

By: Paul Lancaster

Paul Lancaster — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 19:15:56 +0000

Sounds to me like these universities see the writing on the wall that the most talented individuals are no longer “easy money”. They are now at risk of not contributing their IP to institutions and these institutions are trying desperately to keep the students “interested” in graduating rather than just going directly to start-ups. The Sea Change is underway. Degrees mean less than they used to in a very competitive and intensely innovative marketplace. Why not just start an incubator for the most talented individuals and allow them to be free of having to take basket-weaving in favor of getting started on their true passion immediately. It’s like the NCAA argument for keeping kids in college football or basketball when they can get paid now for their talents.

By: Matt Eagar

Matt Eagar — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 18:52:16 +0000

I don’t understand why it is problematic for private industry to contribute research dollars to publicly funded institutions. Japan has very strict limits on funding that their academics can receive from the private sector, and it severely handicaps the kinds of research projects that get funding there. By comparison, MIT in particular was early to embrace the participation of private industry (the Media Lab is but one embodiment of this mindset), and the result has been one of the world’s strongest research institutions. Especially with tightening government coffers (sequestration, anyone?), we should be thrilled to see private dollars funding both research and student degrees – things that might go away otherwise.

In fact, this is really a two-way street, as the DoD and other government agencies have made it a focus over the last couple of decades to try to source as much as possible from commercial, off-the-shelf (COTS) sources in order to save the government money. The reality is that the more uses we find for a given technology (i.e., the bigger its scale), the cheaper it is for everyone, whether we are speaking about academics, government, or private industry.

By: Steve Ardire

Steve Ardire — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 17:46:21 +0000

Ito kinda clever offering another hook or incentive for big name companies already funding MIT programs.

NET NET: the competition with incubators and investment players that already do university and seed capital like Intel Capital is intensifying.

I also think the Upstart model which invests in promising graduates of specified schools in return for a percentage of their future earnings sounds like indentured servants 2.0 ;)