Winter Quarter at Stanford DCI
I've completed 4 weeks of my second quarter at Stanford DCI and the experience has been intellectually rich, highly demanding on reading and incredible on student interactions. I rate it high on a sense of personal development and community bonding.
My classes this quarter are on Entrepreneurship in EdTech, Successful Business Models in Emerging Markets, How to be a Designer in Society and Introduction to Sanskrit through Valmiki’s Ramayana.
The course on Designer in Society is focused on psychological well-being and is structured creatively as a ‘book club’. We are given a book list (The Adjusted American, Of Men and Machines, Player Piano, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Wright Brothers, Seeing is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees, Plain & Simple, The Achievement Habit) & challenged to read 1 book per week, which we then discuss in a circle of 12 students (a mix of master's and undergrads).
Am amazed at how thoughtful, mature, and grounded the students are from the insights and observations they share. The two projects we have to work on, as we progress with our readings, are eliminating one thing from your life and adding one thing to your life. Tough one!
Sanskrit in China
Learning Sanskrit has been rewarding and wholesome. It is a small class of 7 students, and most of them are way ahead of me in their knowledge of grammar.
We read chapters from the Ramayana, deconstruct the sentences for grammar/vocabulary and also listen to chanting of the shlokas. The professor is very chilled and patient with us. An interesting aspect of the class is a 10 min presentation by students on any aspect of the Ramayana that interests them.
I kicked this off with a nuanced version of Ravana beyond the stereotypical demon - for which I got inspiration from Amish Tripathi. Other presentations were about Valmiki’s past before he wrote the Ramayana, Dasavathara - the 10 incarnations of Lord Vishnu, a personal account of a Chinese scholar who went to Germany to study Sanskrit, and an interesting investigation on medical conditions and Ayurvedic treatments referenced in the Ramayana. I could never have imagined studying Sanskrit at Stanford! The last I encountered the language was when I was in Primary school.
David Rogier, Founder of MasterClass
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The Edtech class is a joint offering between the Graduate School of Education and the Graduate School of Business. The content is beautifully curated and run by a highly successful entrepreneur-in-residence who also has vast experience in
investing in education companies globally.
The case studies are well-written and contemporary (Masterclass, Guild, GSV Ventures, TAL), with founders of the companies coming to the class as guest speakers. We have weekly readings with team presentations of the cases, and for our final assignment, we have to come up with an idea for a new venture. Really exciting, especially when you think of innovation possibilities with AI!
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Successful Business Models in Emerging Markets was one of the best classes I have ever attended. The professor is simply brilliant and is a fine example of head and heart. He is rigorous and yet disarming with an informal vibe and a charming sense of humour.
The way he sets up the context for the cases, elicits student responses, builds on ideas, and moderates the discussion is magical. The icing on the cake is that founders of the ventures (eg: Bridge Academies, Aravind Eye Care, Nubank) come to the class as guest speakers.
The professor knows the ventures inside and out, and that is what makes the discussion and learning so rich and engaging.
The CEO of Aravind Eye care dialing in from Madurai, India
