By Cesar Romero
For years we have been hearing in the news about education and how our educational system is failing to effectively educate our present and future generations focusing more on quantity and grades rather than quality and complete proficiency in understanding and implementing a concept. It’s no secret that American students are falling behind in science and math to their counterparts in other countries like China and India because there’s a crisis in our educational system that needs to be addressed.
I want to introduce you to Salman Khan, a man on a mission to revamp our traditional educational model by leveraging the use of technology and providing a free world-class education to anyone anywhere. As a Harvard and MIT graduate with a background in science and math, Mr. Khan has always had a passion for education and he realized that he’s true calling was to teach when he had an epiphany while tutoring his cousins about 7 years ago. At that time, Mr. Khan was working as a hedge fund analyst for a company in Boston and while visiting him from New Orleans, his aunt told him that Nadia (his cousin) was having problems with a particular subject in math and that it was not allowing her to be placed in a more advanced track for 7th grade. Mr. Khan offered to remotely tutor Nadia, who lives in New Orleans, for 1 hour after work as long as she was willing to do any extra work that he gave her, and this was the beginning of something I consider to be revolutionary in the wa y education is delivered.
Mr. Khan began remotely tutoring Nadia in August 2004 using a telephone to talk and Yahoo Doodle as a shared notepad. Nadia ended up catching up and getting ahead of her class and this triggered Mr. Khan to tutor her brothers as well. Eventually, word got around and he was remotely tutoring a handful of cousins and family friends. Since the schedule coordination became difficult because of time constraints, Mr. Khan started making YouTube videos for them to watch in their own time, at their own pace and it didn’t take long for him to realize that other students were hungry for videos like these so he kept adding more and more videos to his library and this collections of videos became what we know now as The Khan Academy.
For years, Mr. Khan was hesitant about dedicating himself full time to this project because he felt he wasn’t financially ready and he felt like what he was doing was not anything new and it wouldn’t become widespread and resonate with other people. It was the hundreds of letters and comments he would receive a week from students, parents, and teachers all over the world expressing strong appreciation for his work that inspired him to quit his job as a hedge fund analyst and dedicate his life to education and making Khan Academy the world’s first free, world-class virtual school where anyone can learn anything for free.
Mr. Khan explains that in our traditional educational system, everyone is forced to move at the same pace and it doesn’t cater to the different learning abilities of each individual. In our traditional system, the teacher broadcasts a lesson to about 30, sometimes up to 50 students, then there’s homework/practice, followed by a quiz where you receive a grade of A, B, C, D and so on depending on the knowledge you acquired through the lectures and practice. The problem with this is that those students that got a grade of B or less, and sometimes even the student that received an A, have a gap in knowledge that most of the time is not addressed because the class must move on and stick to the program resulting in an accumulation of gaps that creates difficulties when advancing to more complex subjects and concepts. Mr. Khan’s model hopes to close that gap between lesson, practice, and assessment through video tutorials, practice exercises and interactive games, and assessment software that measures the level of proficiency of a student in a particular concept/subject. Mr. Khan, is not trying to substitute teachers around the world but rather providing a tool that allows teachers to automate the “broadcast” lecture and focus more on those students that show deficiency in understanding a concept.
Here is a letter Mr. Khan received from a YouTube user in September 2009 that inspired him to pursue his calling:
“Mr. Khan,
No teacher has ever done me any good–this may sound harsh but I mean it quite literally. I was force fed medication to keep me from talking and chastised for not speaking out when called on. Where I am from blacks are not welcomed with open arms into schools–my mother and her sisters had to go to a small shack two hours from home when they went to school. About five years ago my family collected enough money to move from where i was born, so that I could have a chance at having an education and living a real life. But without a real mastery of elementary math I was slow to progress.
I am now in college and learning more than I ever have in my life. But an inadequate math background has been holding me back. I found the Kahn Academy in June of 2009, right after I completed Math 141 ( a college algebra course). I have spent the entire summer on your youtube page. And I just wanted to thank you for everything you are doing. You are a Godsend. Last week I tested for a math placement exam and I am now in Honors Math 200. No question was answered incorrectly. My placement test holder was so impressed by the breadth of my knowledge of math that he said I should be in Linear algebra.
Mr. Khan, I can say without any doubt that you have changed my life and the lives of everyone in my family.
I wish you and the Khan Academy the best of luck.”
How can you not get inspired after receiving a letter like this? This letter validated Mr. Khan’s efforts and gave him the push he needed to dedicate his life to his project. I cannot think of anything more rewarding than feeling and knowing that you are making a difference in someone’s life through your actions. Khan Academy’s tutorials have become so widespread that got the attention of Bill Gates and Google, who are providing funding to this non-profit organization to continue with its mission and vision of educating the world.
I encourage you to take a look at this website that is on its way to changing the way education is delivered; it should not be seen as a threat to the traditional educational model, but as a tool that will help improve and close the existing gaps in our educational system.
www.khanacademy.org
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[Post Tags: khan academy, non-profit education, free education, volunteer educators]
Article by Cesar Romero. Check out his Blog for similar ideas and tips.
From: http://ping.fm/tjUNm
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