Education

Due to my unpleasant time in university, I am building Learn Anything to improve learning and using knowledge gained to build great things. One big thing I took away from my time with official education is it's never worth stressing over it.

There is more and more homeschoolers for good reason. There should be more tools built for them. Tools like Primer, Khan Academy, Learney & Synthesis.

What's wild to me is just how few people can write code. Some say it's ~ 30M. Trying my best to push this number up. Being able to code is not only for the job of becoming a programmer, it's a skill that you can apply in the world of atoms too. Lots of things to be automated still.

Notes

• Try to use multiple aspects of your brain at once when learning. One of the best "learn about learning" lessons I ever had was studying jazz theory. My teacher used a four-way method of learning chords - say the name of the chord, visualize it on the keyboard, feel the shape your hands make to play the chord, and listen to the sound of the chord. I've applied this sort of approach to all sorts of skills since then.
• Go for a quick read, minus derivations. Then do the derivations in a slow read. For more thorough understanding of physics/math textbooks & research papers.
• We have a system where everyone is forced to be educated, but no one is allowed to think, ever.
• The future of education isn't cohort-based courses.
• An honest reorganization of the school system would focus on food first, pleasant environments second, and "education" third.
• Degrees are often expensive and correlate primarily with parental wealth rather than actual ability. Companies should not require them.
• When anything can be learned online, the barrier to education is simply motivation, curiosity, and persistence.

Links

• Do schools kill creativity
• Abstraction, intuition, and the “monad tutorial fallacy" (HN)
• Steve Jobs on Education and Conspiracy Theories....
• A Survival Guide to a PhD (2016)
• Solvio - Decentralized education system. Our mission is to build a P2P education system that will be equivalent to a formal education.
• Solvio Regular Call #2 (2019)
• Imagine K12 Startups
• Primer Labs White Paper - Incremental approach for building an intelligent tutoring system using a dialog based agent.
• Danny Hillis, "The Learning Map" (2012)
• LRMI specification - Collection of properties to describe educational resources.
• Coursedog - All-in-One Schedule and Curriculum Planning.
• On Graduating or: What to Optimize For (2019)
• The Lesson to Unlearn (2019) (HN)
• Broken beyond bias: high-stakes tests are failing students and society (2020) (Tweet)
• The Ph.D. Octopus
• Dev Degree - 4-year, work-integrated learning program that combines hands-on developer experience at Shopify with an accredited Computer Science degree from either Carleton University or York University.
• Locally-Adaptive Nonparametric Online Learning (2020)
• YC, not Lambda School, is unbundling education (HN)
• Avenify - Apply for up to \$15,000 in interest-free funding. No credit score, cosigner, or collateral required.
• Why are Soviet math textbooks so hardcore in comparison to US textbooks? (2017) (HN) (Reddit)
• Word Problems in Russia and America
• HN: Some school districts plan to end the year early, call remote learning too tough (2020)
• HN: Some overwhelmed parents are abandoning at-home schooling (2020)
• HN: Unimpressed by online classes, college students file lawsuits for refunds (2020)
• Learning in depth: knowledge and the imagination
• Primer - Building a new kind of education company. (Article)
• ZipSchool - Online classes for curious kids.
• Raise - Provides paid training and mentorship to software developers with an emphasis on production applications, team collaboration, and industry best practices.
• Prenda School - In-home microschools led by inspiring mentors.
• DormDev - Home of student developers.
• The technical literacy crisis
• Reimagining the PhD (2019)
• CS education in higher education (2020)
• Collaborative Learning Platform
• Micro Learning Futures
• Video Games Are the Future of Education (2020) (HN)
• The state of online learning (2020)
• Homeschooled: Laura Deming, Scientist & Founder of The Longevity Fund (2020) (HN)
• The future of education looks like Y Combinator. Here are 10 things schools can learn from the program. (2020)
• Ask HN: Something like Khan Academy but full curriculum for grade schoolers? (2020)
• Consider getting a “DIY” degree online instead of a traditional CS major (HN)
• Harvard CS professor David Malan built a distance-learning empire (HN)
• A College Degree Is No Guarantee of a Good Life (2020) (HN)
• Epihub - Shopify for teaching online. (HN)
• MLH Fellowship - Spend 12-weeks remotely leveling up your skills & building out your portfolio under the guidance of an expert mentor. (Experience of doing the program)
• Syllabus for Eric's PhD Students (2020) (HN)
• How to Pick Your Grad School (2020)
• EdTech trends (2020)
• Why I Left My Tenured Academic Job (2020) (HN)
• A to Z Resources for Students
• Ranking Web of Universities
• Canvas LMS - Modern, open-source LMS. (Web)
• CS50's Zoom Setup for Live Classes (2021)
• Resources for Ph.D. students
• Ask HN: Is abuse from supervisors as common in industry as in academia? (2021)
• Questions for Potential Advisors
• How to increase viewpoint diversity in academia
• Oppia - Free, Online and Interactive Lessons for Anyone. (Code)
• Ask HN: Moving to US from Argentina for college. Any advice for a newcomer? (2021)
• Applying to STEM Ph.D. Programs Guide
• Moodle - Open-source learning platform. (Code)
• Strong/Weak Reasons to do a PhD in Computer Science (2021)
• Someone has to run the fabs (2021)
• Juni Learning - Online Coding Classes for Kids.
• UPchieve - Live tutoring for low-income students. (HN)
• Synthesis - Weekly simulations for kids ages 6-14. (Twitter) (Tweet) (Decentralizing Education with Synthesis)
• Life lessons I wish school taught us. (2021)
• Incentive Misalignment in Higher Education with Jason Brennan (2021)
• Is education no longer the ‘great equalizer’? (2021) (HN)
• Master’s degrees are the second biggest scam in higher education? (2021) (HN)
• A generation of American men give up on college (2021) (HN)
• Information Engineering in Cambridge (2021)
• Germany has one of the lowest tuition fees (HN)
• The Case Against Teaching (2001)
• Sprout9 - Platform for students to find tutors. (HN)
• Is college worth it? A return-on-investment analysis (2021) (HN)
• Thread of studies in learning and education
• Is public education compatible with free speech? (2021) (Tweet)
• Helping students with pair programming (2021) (HN)
• teach-in - YouTube
• Things You Are Allowed To Do, Academic Edition (2021)
• Ask HN: Why is there no good open-source LMS? (2021)
• Pupilfirst - Online Teaching Platform & LMS. (Code)
• Udemus - Learning community.
• HN: California moves to recommend delaying algebra to 9th grade statewide (2021)
• Courses that should be mandated in school
• What’s your unconventional college or career advice? (2021)
• Lessons from my PhD (2021) (Tweet) (HN)
• Completing a part-time Master's in computer science while working (2022) (HN)
• Teaching how to code is broken (HN) (Lobsters)
• How to Drop Out (HN)
• List of resources on how/why to do a PhD
• Awesome PhD
• I think US college education is nearer to collapsing than it appears (2022) (HN)
• Collection of advice for prospective and current PhD students
• Agora Flat Online Classroom (Code)
• Building e-learning applications with Daily (2022)
• PrairieLearn - Online problem-driven learning system for creating homeworks and tests.
• Ask HN: If you’ve considered homeschooling, what’s stopping you? (2022)
• OpenStax - Free and Flexible Textbooks and Resources. (HN)