I woke up yesterday to a Twitter tsunami with some Silicon Valley folks intrigued by my academic adventures.
I thought Iād share a couple of thoughts on why Iāve pursued a fair amount of higher education over the last 10 years.
I am extremely passionate about learning. Learning keeps us growing, evolving and developing.
Iāve been inspired by legends like the late Julian Robertson who kept obsessively learning through investing into his early 90s and my 95 year old granddad who reads voraciously everyday.
Firstly, while learning from sources like operating experience, the news, podcasts and books as well as expert networks, advisors and mentors are all valuable, these styles of learning are not complete. Many of the professors at top universities are some of the worldās foremost minds who have rigorously studied their field in painstaking detail for decades. Are they as poetic in presentation as a TikTok video? No. They are, however, grounded in precision, empirical evidence and rigor. I donāt need entertaining delivery but I do want exposure to some of the best thinkers globally in an efficient format.
Secondly, casual consumption of new ideas is valuable but Iāve found the structured learning process of having to write arguments, learn new content and go through a defined, comprehensive curriculum to be a great way to deeply explore new frontiers. In the same way, a personal trainer drives you into shape, structured learning environments ensure you donāt stop learning. With very little time outside of Crimson, these environments make sure I am continuing to build new knowledge in exciting areas. I like to be ālearning on autopilotā and this makes sure even when I am feeling slack, I am growing.
Thirdly, while much of my time spent building Crimson is in on the scaling of our organization now with more than 900 employees in 23 countries and thousands of mentors, I still love to mentor Crimson students. I like to lead from the front. Being able to share insights across many domains our students are fascinated by and giving them context on different universities and programs helps them to best achieve their education dreams with precision.
I have full respect for the folks that have the courage to drop out of university (Thiel fellows are very smart!) and also sympathy for the arguments that higher education is out-of-touch, unnecessary and expensive.
For me, my education across fields like education, business, law and finance has been instrumental to building Crimson with our team from a small start-up to the global leader in our industry.
Everyone has different approaches. Mine is unusual and extreme but I hope it makes you think. The Silicon Valley narrative of school being useless and university being irrelevant is dangerous for the vast majority of learners, especially those in high school.
Whatever way you learn that works for you is fantastic.
My 2 cents: just donāt stop
cc Fangzhou Jiang, our Crimson co-founder
I thought Iād share a couple of thoughts on why Iāve pursued a fair amount of higher education over the last 10 years.
I am extremely passionate about learning. Learning keeps us growing, evolving and developing.
Iāve been inspired by legends like the late Julian Robertson who kept obsessively learning through investing into his early 90s and my 95 year old granddad who reads voraciously everyday.
Firstly, while learning from sources like operating experience, the news, podcasts and books as well as expert networks, advisors and mentors are all valuable, these styles of learning are not complete. Many of the professors at top universities are some of the worldās foremost minds who have rigorously studied their field in painstaking detail for decades. Are they as poetic in presentation as a TikTok video? No. They are, however, grounded in precision, empirical evidence and rigor. I donāt need entertaining delivery but I do want exposure to some of the best thinkers globally in an efficient format.
Secondly, casual consumption of new ideas is valuable but Iāve found the structured learning process of having to write arguments, learn new content and go through a defined, comprehensive curriculum to be a great way to deeply explore new frontiers. In the same way, a personal trainer drives you into shape, structured learning environments ensure you donāt stop learning. With very little time outside of Crimson, these environments make sure I am continuing to build new knowledge in exciting areas. I like to be ālearning on autopilotā and this makes sure even when I am feeling slack, I am growing.
Thirdly, while much of my time spent building Crimson is in on the scaling of our organization now with more than 900 employees in 23 countries and thousands of mentors, I still love to mentor Crimson students. I like to lead from the front. Being able to share insights across many domains our students are fascinated by and giving them context on different universities and programs helps them to best achieve their education dreams with precision.
I have full respect for the folks that have the courage to drop out of university (Thiel fellows are very smart!) and also sympathy for the arguments that higher education is out-of-touch, unnecessary and expensive.
For me, my education across fields like education, business, law and finance has been instrumental to building Crimson with our team from a small start-up to the global leader in our industry.
Everyone has different approaches. Mine is unusual and extreme but I hope it makes you think. The Silicon Valley narrative of school being useless and university being irrelevant is dangerous for the vast majority of learners, especially those in high school.
Whatever way you learn that works for you is fantastic.
My 2 cents: just donāt stop
cc Fangzhou Jiang, our Crimson co-founder
