Students Must Lead on Campus

I've spent the last year working in Innovation & Entrepreneurship at Duke (specifically helping InCube) and have finally realized that students that must lead entrepreneurship efforts.

As hard as we administrators attempt to lead efforts, they usually fall flat if students are not at the helm.  Just like Brad Feld explains in his Startup Communities book, we as "feeders" need to understand our place in the world and not attempt to drive the bus.

So what should university administrators be doing?  In the startup world, entrepreneurs would say "feeders" (CED, Government, Chamber of Commerce, etc) should simply buy the beer and get out of the way.

Translation for the university:  Buy the pizza and get out of the way of student leaders.

If we DO, we will LEARN

Recently my church made an amazing change to the way we teach our youth (see Come Follow Me) by encouraging our young people to do most of their learning during the week (scripture study, choosing good friends, Family Home Evening) and then encouraging them to share what they learned when they get to church on Sunday.  I'm so excited to have my 3 little ones to learn this way.

This principle resonated this morning as I was studying John 7:17, "If any will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself."  Learning by doing has always been the secret formula.  

Two examples from the secular world:

1.  I love playing and watching basketball.  Just imagine if all your learning in basketball came in a classroom.  Then you were expected to go out a play a big game with no practice time on the court.

2.  Teaching entrepreneurship has become a passion and too often high schools and universities spend the majority of their time in the classroom.  For example, to grow entrepreneurial thinking on a college campus we can't simply hire an army of academics to teach more classes.  Hackathons, competitions, pro-bono projects, and independent studies are how students will learn.

More Dan Kimbergs & less Scott Kellys

I'm 36 years old and would not trade my experiences for anything.  I do however want my children to take a different path than I did.  I want them to align their passions, profit, and purpose faster than I did.  When I was choosing a career in college I believe I remember someone saying, "Go into computers because you can get a job there."  So I did and thought I reached my goal when I began a career at IBM.  The dream was short lived as I spent many hours in a factory type environment where I basically reviewed online forms all day to see if all the blanks were filled in.

Now I've finally realized that I'm going to solve education problems after 15 years of wandering in the wilderness.  Now I believe I can help my children get to this point faster through things like Gap Years, Missionary Service, Military Service, Time Away From School, etc.  I see many young people itching to go to college and hurry to get out so they can begin their career.  My advice to them, "Slow Down!"  Your investment in a gap year or year off will deliver at least 10x returns since the ability to change careers is sometimes difficult once you start that investment banking job right out of Duke.

Where does Dan Kimberg fit in here?  For those of you who don't know him, he's an amazing guy who created StudentU right out of college (or a short time after college).  His time floundering to find his alignment of purpose, passions, and profits seems to have been short.  (By the way, one definition of profits is the ability to earn a decent living since I know he is not paying himself big bucks.)  Unlinke, my 15 year journey of pivoting to find my purpose, Dan immediately began his mission after college.

Let us all challenge the traditional 16 year plan (12 years of elementary, middle, high school + 4 years of college) and better understand that we have not reached our end goal if we simply focus on graduating more individuals from college.