Middleburry College to Push Innovation Curriculum
What? A liberal arts college located in west-central Vermont pushing innovation! That’s right.
According to a few directors from the college:
“The goal of the new initiative is to develop an environment in which students can exercise creativity, pursue innovation and become more comfortable with intellectual risk-taking during their four years as students at Middlebury College… this initiative seeks to supplement what Middlebury students learn in class with opportunities to enrich their out-of-class experiences, specifically for the sake of getting students to act on their creativity – to make the process of innovation second nature and part of their lifetime critical skills portfolio.
As a graduate of Earlham College, I think this is great. I have always felt that a liberal arts education and innovation go hand in hand as they both involve creativity, free thinking and just about everything but business. You can force an idea into a business model, but you can not expect innovative ideas to stream from people who only think in terms of business models.
Check out this panel discussion from Guy Kawasaki’s blog featuring 6 founders of successful websites (hi5,Suicide Girls, Slide, HotorNot, PlentyofFish, and Fark). As Guy points out: “If you’d like to learn how these companies became successful without proven teams, proven technology, and proven business models, you’ll love this video.” The title of the entry is “Panel of Web Community Founders: Utter Defiance of the “Venture Capital” Model.
I think Middlebury might be on to something. Here’s an idea: They should propose an internship program with the Suicide Girls. Oh boy, I better stop there before the PC police take down this blog 🙂