Khan Academy

Salman Khan - The Teacher

Khan Academy is a non-profit organization which delivers online tutorials to students through videos uploaded on YouTube. The Academy is created by a Bangladeshi American educator Salman Khan. The tutorials teaches almost all education disciplines like Mathematics, History, Finance, Medical, Science, Physics, Chemistry, Economics, etc. Funds for this non-profit organization come from Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation & Google.

Khan Academy has revolutionized the way students can learn in this age. With the stated mission of “providing a high quality education to anyone, anywhere, anytime”, it's digital archive on YouTube contains more than 3,200 micro lectures. Number of unique visitors watching these videos have already surpassed 5 million.

The students can learn at their very own pace and convenience by watching these videos. There is no interference from any of the teachers and there is no one to ask, “Did you understand this?”. In case of any doubt, the student can playback the session as many times as needed.

What things can we learn from Khan Academy? Can we relate it to the concepts studied in Principles of Management subject? We certainly can.

1.  Theory X and Theory Y Manager (more here):

Here the student learning through the online videos can be considered as a good employee who works effortlessly to achieve his/her goal (to learn as much as possible). He/she is not distracted by outside interference and can learn at one's own pace and in a flexible way.

The teacher too can analyze the progress of the student through the online analytical tool and can help the student if required. Here the student behaves analogous to a “good employee” and the teacher behaves analogous to a “good manager”. Both of them can work in a symbiotic way to do good for one another.

2.   Globalization:

In this era of flat world, it’s important to go global. Khan Academy did the same thing by posting the videos over internet, thus enabling people across the world to watch them and learn at their convenience. Any organization today needs to go global if they think of promoting their organization to a world-class level.

3.   Social Responsibility:

   

      Organizations today need to be much more socially responsible than ever. Khan Academy works towards the betterment of the society by providing them free and world-class education. Its organizational plan revolves around social cause. Not all organization’s plan can revolve around social cause; however they do need to ensure that it’s their responsibility to give it back to the society in which they are flourishing. 

4.    Entrepreneurship:

      A single idea, just one single idea can change the way things are perceived around the world. Though initially Salman Khan created these videos for his cousins, however seeing the response received from many students across the globe, he left his job and took up this noble cause of promoting free education. And this was when he did not have much money at his disposal.

We need “Entrepreneurs” in this age. Unique ideas from a lot of different entrepreneurs can change the way things happen in the world. As our professor Dr. Mandi rightly says, “Aaj ki roti aaj hi kamana”, we need to be entrepreneurs and earn for ourself rather than working for others.

           
Innovation:


Innovation was one of the first things that would catch someone's eye and it was promoted well by Salman Khan. He did a wonderful job of starting with web tools which gives useful information to anyone viewing the video. There is this wonderful knowledge true that takes you through all the concepts of a subject in a gradual progressive way so that we don't miss any concepts and jump topics. 

And still, this guy is such a down-to-earth person. His work has already touched millions of people around the world. Donations keep on pouring from all corners of the world.


Truly amazing guy, isn't it?