Minerva Project: seeks to satisfy global demand for an elite education
"Elite American universities maintain their prestige by turning away a huge percentage of applicants every year. And the education entrepreneur Ben Nelson sees an opportunity in this demand for top-flight education: He wants to reach talented students across the world and to build a new university that could remake the image of Ivy League education.
Mr. Nelson, founder of a start-up called the Minerva Project, believes the minuscule acceptance rates at prestigious institutions leave some college-bound students without a place where they can pursue a blue-ribbon degree. So his for-profit enterprise seeks to satisfy that demand by offering a rigorous online education to the brightest students around the world who slip through the cracks of highly selective admissions cycles. ...
To create these advanced courses, Minerva will break down the role of professor into two distinct jobs instead of simply poaching faculty members from other universities. The company will award monetary prizes to 'distinguished teachers among great research faculty,' Mr. Nelson said, who will team up with crews to videotape lectures and craft innovative courses when they are not teaching at their home institutions. (Mr. Nelson declined to elaborate on the size of the prizes.)
Minerva will then hire a second group of instructors to deliver the material. Mr. Nelson called them 'preceptors,' who will typically be young graduates of doctoral programs—they will lead class discussions online, hold office hours, and grade assignments."
(Nick DeSantis, 3 April 2012, The Chronicle of Higher Education)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Pledge Me: funding platform for creative projects
"PledgeMe is here to provide a collaborative way to help fund creative projects for anyone who has an idea they want to see happen, and just as importantly, give support to those who wish to contribute to the success of a project.
When a project is successful and reaches or exceeds the funding goal the project requires, the total amount raised by the contributions of the supporters is passed on to the creator of the project, minus the percentage due to PledgeMe. If a project is not successful and doesn't reach its funding goal, the funding intended for the project doesn't get charged to the supporters of the project."
(Camilo Borges, Anna Guenther, Prue Clark and Amy Bowie)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Dribbble: a show and tell web application for designers
"Dribbble is a community of designers answering that question each day. Web designers, graphic designers, illustrators, icon artists, typographers, logo designers, and other creative types share small screenshots that show their work, process, and current projects.
Dribbble is a place to show and tell, promote, discover, and explore design."
(Rich Thornett & Dan Cederholm)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Butcher's Hook: three students repurpose an old London butcher's shop to establish their design studio
"Butcher's Hook is (or perhaps that should be will be) a three-member design studio and gallery based in an old butcher's shop in London's Portobello. The studio has been formed by Benio Urbanowicz, James Coltman, Josh Blanchett and Dan Jones, students from Kingston and LLC, all of whom graduate this summer. ...
In order to introduce themselves to the local populace, Butcher's Hook set up a digital display using an old Nintendo Wii remote, custom made Infa-Red yellow pencils, a wireless doorbell, a printer and a few extra ingredients.
'We gave away free art made by the user themselves, with the option to receive a digital copy sent to them,' they say. 'We had a great weekend, where over 150 people got involved, through their own choice... and every single one went home to find our business cards printed on the back of their own masterpiece.'
As well as launching their studio, Butcher's Hook has also entered the project into the D&AD Student Awards in response to the brief Make Your Mark."
Posted by Creative Review, 4 April 2012, 16:13
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Zootool: a social bookmarking tool
"Zootool is about collecting, organizing and sharing your favorite images, videos, documents and links from all over the internet.
We are a small, bootstrapped startup, located in Mannheim, Germany. Driven by a passion for design, web, code and all kind of nerdery, we are working hard to built the most awesome bookmark tool for geeks like us and people who love the web."
(Bastian Allgeier, Hartmut Wöhlbier and Nicolas Cormier)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
