After Words: "The One World Schoolhouse: Education Reimagined"

WEBVTT
Kind: captions
Language: en

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Nina: Hi, Sal. Tell us a little bit about

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your book and the journey
that you underwent before you

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started the Khan Academy which led you

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to writing this book.

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Sal: Yes, well the book
is it's a little bit about

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that journey, but really
the journey informed what

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Khan Academy has now
become and then how that

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could inform maybe what
classrooms could become

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or what learning could become.

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Not in just a pie in
the sky kind of way, but

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this is really happening
and it really feels like

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we're at this inflection point

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and what's going on in classrooms.

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This whole adventure
for me started somewhat,

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actually very inadvertently, it was 2004.

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I was working as an analyst
at a hedge fund at the time.

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Just gotten married,
family from New Orleans

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visiting me in Boston after
my wedding and it turned

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out this one cousin,
Nadia, was having trouble.

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12-years-old.

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I had trouble believing that.

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She's an extremely bright girl.

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We share a certain amount
of DNA too. (laughter)

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When I asked her about
it; it was actually her

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mom who told me and I
asked Nadia about it.

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She said, "Oh yeah, I'm
having trouble with units."

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I said, "Let me tutor you,"
and I think she thought

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I was just bluffing so I said,

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"No, we're going to work this out."

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She went back to New
Orleans, got on the phone.

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We ended up using some
tools on the internet so we

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could see each other's
scrawls initially with a mouse

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and then we got these
little pen tablet things.

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Long story short, she went
from being a struggling

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student to catching up
with her class and then

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becoming a somewhat advanced student.

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I joke I became a tiger
cousin at that point. (laughs)

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I called her school and I said,

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"I really think Nadia needs
to retake a placement exam,"

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and they said, "Who are you?"

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I said, "I'm her cousin."

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Then I started tutoring her
brothers and fast forward

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two years, word got around
free tutoring was happening.

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I was tutoring 10-15
family, friends, cousins.

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It was at that point and
the firm I was working for,

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it was a firm but it was
my boss and his dog and me,

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we moved to Silicon Valley.

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I was telling a friend
about all the stuff I was

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doing with my cousins and
I was complaining that

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it was getting hard to scale.

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I still had a day job.

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All these students around
the country with time zones,

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et cetera, et cetera, and
he said, "Well, why don't

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you make some tutorials,
stick them up on YouTube?"

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I thought that was a silly idea.

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YouTube is for cats
playing piano, not serious.

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But I gave it a shot and long story short,

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that started getting a ton of traction.

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People started looking at it.

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The reality is I was also
working on this little

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software tool for my cousins
and so there was this

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view that hey maybe this could be

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an institution to help people.

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It was set up as a
not-for-profit and then in 2009,

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I had trouble focusing on my day job.

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I quit and started doing
Khan Academy full time.

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Nina: Tell a little bit
about the Khan Academy.

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What is the business model?

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Let's start with the big,
hairy, audacious school

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which I just found very
big and audacious and then

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the business model that
you've based it on.

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Sal: Yes. Maybe I'll go
the other way around.

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When I was starting all
of this and I was sitting

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in the middle of Silicon Valley.

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I came from a very for-profit reality.

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I had friends who were
venture capitalists saying

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hey Sal, we could fund
this and it could be this

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double bottom line business
or whatever that means.

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There was a lot of
temptation there and there's

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nothing wrong with that,
but there was this feeling;

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I was getting all of this
emotional reward from these

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thank you letters that
people were sending me and

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the sense that hey, I was
making these simple things

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for my cousin and at
first tens of thousands,

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hundreds of thousands and
now millions of students

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are using it around the world.

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I'd like this stuff to be
around in a hundred years

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or in 500 years and I don't
want this collection of

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software and content and
this organization, I don't

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want it to skew from this
mission of being able

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to reach these people.

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When I look at other
organizations in the universe

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that are able to do that,
last many, many hopefully

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centuries and stay true to a
mission, it's a not-for-profit.

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Where there is no ownership;
it's a public charity.

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I said, "Oh, I should set
this up as a not-for-profit,"

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not quite understanding
what that is and I remember

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when I was doing that
initial paperwork for it,

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the IRS asks you what's your mission.

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I kind of thought about
it for maybe three or four

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minutes and I said a free
world class education

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for anyone, anywhere.

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Nina: Why not?

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Sal: Why not?

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Well, you know you never
want something that you could

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just say check it's
done; it's an aspiration.

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and it was a very delusional
aspiration at the time.

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I was literally operating out of a closet.

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The business model is
we're not a business.

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We're a 501C3 not-for-profit,
but we still have to

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sustain ourselves and the
way we want to because we

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always want the learning
side of education,

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we always want that to
be free because we think

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that's what empowers people.

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It's primarily foundation and
philanthropist driven so far,

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but we do think there are
ways to sustain itself

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in other ways, whether
it's licensing content

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or who knows what.

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We're starting to explore that,

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but we're pretty true to
keeping the content free.

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Nina: Sure. How many
students are you serving

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right now, how many instructors?

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Can you give me a sense as to how large

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of an enterprise and
what's the typical profile

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of someone who comes to your website?

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Sal: Yes. The organization
itself, we're 36 people

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so we're still relatively small.

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It feels huge for me
because last year we were 13

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and the year before that we were one.

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We've been growing fast,
but in this past month

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we reached 7 million
students, unique students.

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We've reached a total
of 60 million unique.

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That's the way you measure,

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unique students on the web.

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Delivered 180 million
lessons, 700 million problems

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have been done on the site.

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It's students all over the world.

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Pretty much every country
in the world, someone

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has used Khan Academy in some way.

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Twenty thousand teachers,
as far as we can tell

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from our data, are using
it in their classes or

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with their cohorts in some type of way.

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It's kind of crazy.

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It's surreal for where it came from.

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Nina: Yes, let's talk a
little bit about how a

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classroom or a school
can use you, this concept

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of flipped classroom.

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Explain that to our viewers.

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Sal: Yes and I'll do two
things because this flipped

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classroom has somewhat
been tied to Khan Academy

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and it is an interesting
idea and it is, I think,

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a forward step, but part
of the whole point of this

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whole book was to show
people we're not necessarily

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about the flip; we're
about pushing the envelope

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even further than the flip.

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In a flip model, right now
at home, you do problems,

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traditionally, that's called homework.

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In the classroom, a lot of time in a

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traditional classroom is spent lectures.

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The flip, and it predates
Khan Academy, early on I

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had these videos out there.

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Some teachers were telling
me hey, you made a decent

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video on meiosis or on projectile motion.

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I don't have to give that lecture anymore.

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My students can watch it
at their own time and pace.

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They can remediate without
taking up class time.

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Then when they go to
class, that's when they can

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either ask me questions,
clarifications and

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we can do problems together.

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It used to be homework,
the problem sets could now

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be done inside the classroom
and the advantage there is

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the real learning occurs
when you do the engagement,

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when you're doing the problem sets.

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I think traditionally
students either don't do

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homework or have trouble
doing homework because

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there's no one at home to help them out.

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Now they're in the classroom,
they have the teacher,

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they have their peers
which is a under-untilized

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resource in the classroom
not only to help you,

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but when you help others
you learn a lot better.

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It also gives the teacher a lens on

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how the class is doing.

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When you're lecturing,
it's very hard to know

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where people are.

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You might be able to poll
them, ask a few questions,

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but it's very hard.

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A lot of times the students
are a little bit blank faces,

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but now if you're doing
problem solving together,

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you can understand where students are

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and diagnosis them and so that's the flip.

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What used to be homework in the classroom,

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what used to be lectures are now at home.

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It makes the classroom interactive.

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Students can get lectures
at their time and pace.

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Great.

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What I focus on a lot
in the book is let's go

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even further because still
even the flip assumes

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that all the students are
going to cover the same

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material at the same pace
together and what I talk

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a lot about is we've all
been indoctrinated in

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the system and when I talk
about the system, I'm not

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talking about what should
be the student/teacher

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ratio or charter or private or public.

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I'm talking about the system.

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I'm talking about grouping
kids by age based cohorts.

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They cover certain subjects at a set pace.

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We grade them based on
their variable understanding

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and then we keep pushing them forward.

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We just assume that's what
school is, but what I go

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to great lengths to show
is no; this is actually

00:09:07.749 --> 00:09:09.285
a relatively new phenomenon.

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It's about 200 years, I
mean it's not that new,

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it's about 200 years old,
but we inherited it from

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a country that no longer
exists, the Prussians.

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In fairness to the Prussians
and even to us I guess,

00:09:24.558 --> 00:09:28.439
during the Industrial
Revolution was the first time

00:09:28.439 --> 00:09:30.130
that people seriously thought about

00:09:30.130 --> 00:09:32.288
how can we educate everybody.

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Before that, it was you're
the son of a lord, a king

00:09:36.287 --> 00:09:38.005
and you would get a private tutor.

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A private tutor was the gold standard.

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They're working at your
pace, they're differentiating

00:09:42.293 --> 00:09:44.745
it for you, but now all
of a sudden in Prussia,

00:09:44.745 --> 00:09:46.483
there's like okay we want
to have mass education.

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How do we do it in a practical way?

00:09:50.035 --> 00:09:51.793
Whoa, it's the Industrial
Revolution; how do we do

00:09:51.793 --> 00:09:53.207
anything in a practical way?

00:09:53.207 --> 00:09:55.163
We stick them on an assembly line and as

00:09:55.163 --> 00:09:57.158
they go through, we do
something to the product

00:09:57.158 --> 00:10:00.000
and hopefully at the end
we have a decent product.

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They essentially applied the
same model to classrooms.

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The kids are in these
buckets based on age.

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It's funny, I was talking
to a friend and her child

00:10:08.375 --> 00:10:10.708
already knows how to
read and everything and

00:10:10.708 --> 00:10:13.039
she was trying to get the
child into kindergarten.

00:10:13.039 --> 00:10:15.949
He was born in October or something.

00:10:15.949 --> 00:10:19.103
The school said oh yes,
he's a very bright kid,

00:10:19.103 --> 00:10:22.111
but we can't; he's too small.

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She came back and she's
like yes, he's too small.

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I was like look, if that's
what they were concerned

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about, they should be
grouping them by size.

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That's the obvious
natural...but that's the model.

00:10:34.050 --> 00:10:37.422
Even the flip is in the
context of that model.

00:10:37.422 --> 00:10:39.645
On week three we cover parabolas.

00:10:39.645 --> 00:10:43.027
Week four we cover systems of equations.

00:10:43.027 --> 00:10:44.347
We give students grades.

00:10:44.347 --> 00:10:46.712
We give them a B and that
B shows that they have

00:10:46.712 --> 00:10:48.922
a gap in their knowledge, a
C, even a D you can get on

00:10:48.922 --> 00:10:51.208
an exam, but then you
move on to the next topic.

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That's usually building
on top of that which is

00:10:53.299 --> 00:10:54.677
pretty much dooming you to failure.

00:10:54.677 --> 00:10:55.764
Nina: Exactly.

00:10:55.764 --> 00:10:58.016
Sal: What I advocate
strongly and we're already

00:10:58.016 --> 00:10:59.706
seeing this in schools
starting to experiment or

00:10:59.706 --> 00:11:02.268
move in this direction
is if you take lecture

00:11:02.268 --> 00:11:03.789
out of the classroom,

00:11:03.789 --> 00:11:05.402
there's no longer the need for everyone

00:11:05.402 --> 00:11:08.126
to move together at the
same pace and as soon as

00:11:08.126 --> 00:11:10.873
you get rid of that
assumption, you can completely

00:11:10.873 --> 00:11:13.082
rethink what a classroom can be.

00:11:13.082 --> 00:11:14.909
You can start having everyone
learn at their own pace.

00:11:14.909 --> 00:11:16.906
You can leverage class
time for when humans are

00:11:16.906 --> 00:11:19.072
together for actual interactivity.

00:11:19.072 --> 00:11:20.496
You can start to say
well why do we only have

00:11:20.496 --> 00:11:21.371
one teacher in the room;

00:11:21.371 --> 00:11:23.122
why can't have two teachers in the room?

00:11:23.122 --> 00:11:24.490
Why do we have a bell ringing?

00:11:24.490 --> 00:11:25.912
This bell ringing, this
is like a factory in

00:11:25.912 --> 00:11:28.795
a 19th Century factory.

00:11:28.795 --> 00:11:30.800
Why do we have a bell
ringing that's saying stop

00:11:30.800 --> 00:11:32.956
what you were doing on chemistry,

00:11:32.956 --> 00:11:35.137
you must now start English?

00:11:35.137 --> 00:11:36.977
Anyone who's ever done
anything creative knows that's

00:11:36.977 --> 00:11:39.429
the best way to stop creativity is to say

00:11:39.429 --> 00:11:42.896
you have exactly 55 minutes
and then you're done.

00:11:42.896 --> 00:11:47.597
What we're advocating is
move to a reality possibly

00:11:47.597 --> 00:11:50.526
with the help of tools
like Khan Academy so that

00:11:50.526 --> 00:11:51.868
every student can learn at their own pace,

00:11:51.868 --> 00:11:54.662
teachers have dashboards,
tools that empower them

00:11:54.662 --> 00:11:58.156
and use class time for
interactivity and creativity.

00:11:58.156 --> 00:11:59.621
Nina: Right, right.

00:11:59.621 --> 00:12:01.820
You touched on this a little
bit, but explain a little

00:12:01.820 --> 00:12:05.654
bit about why is it that
your platform has taken off

00:12:05.654 --> 00:12:07.710
and is getting so much
attention when so many others

00:12:07.710 --> 00:12:10.176
who were kind of doing
the same thing on the

00:12:10.176 --> 00:12:12.413
for-profit side, some
on the non-profit side,

00:12:12.413 --> 00:12:13.682
haven't succeeded?

00:12:13.682 --> 00:12:15.136
Sal: It's an open question.

00:12:15.136 --> 00:12:16.990
It's a question that we
are constantly asking

00:12:16.990 --> 00:12:19.244
ourselves is because whatever
the "secret sauce" is

00:12:19.244 --> 00:12:22.849
we don't want to lose it
somewhere in the process.

00:12:22.849 --> 00:12:26.230
My best guess of why; there
was this initial wave of

00:12:26.230 --> 00:12:33.444
traction from 2006 to it
continues to grow, is those

00:12:33.444 --> 00:12:36.686
first videos, I think
it was fortunate it was

00:12:36.686 --> 00:12:40.845
just some guy making it for his cousins.

00:12:40.845 --> 00:12:41.789
Nina: They were easy to use.

00:12:41.789 --> 00:12:43.154
Sal: They were easy to use.

00:12:43.154 --> 00:12:44.079
They felt very human.

00:12:44.079 --> 00:12:46.014
I think the big learning
is that people were

00:12:46.014 --> 00:12:47.521
hungry; you know I wasn't
the first person to make

00:12:47.521 --> 00:12:49.165
videos on YouTube.

00:12:49.165 --> 00:12:51.669
I wasn't the first person
to think of teaching.

00:12:51.669 --> 00:12:52.621
As soon as radio came out,

00:12:52.621 --> 00:12:53.882
people were saying, oh we'll use this to

00:12:53.882 --> 00:12:55.405
teach the world and then
TV, oh we'll use this to

00:12:55.405 --> 00:12:58.274
teach the world and then
VCR and now it's on demand.

00:12:58.274 --> 00:13:02.490
Historically, it was either
a videotape of someone

00:13:02.490 --> 00:13:07.155
at a chalk board, traditional
class which feels distant

00:13:07.155 --> 00:13:09.102
even when you're in the classroom.

00:13:09.102 --> 00:13:11.059
You're there, I'm over
here, the next step in the

00:13:11.059 --> 00:13:13.495
equation and you do it like that.

00:13:13.495 --> 00:13:16.029
That's not varied and when
you make that in a video

00:13:16.029 --> 00:13:17.162
it's even harder to see.

00:13:17.162 --> 00:13:19.750
What are they writing
there and I can't hear them

00:13:19.750 --> 00:13:22.410
and these felt very personal.

00:13:22.410 --> 00:13:25.491
You're sitting next to me.

00:13:25.491 --> 00:13:26.935
The other dimension of it is

00:13:26.935 --> 00:13:29.670
just a conversational tone.

00:13:29.670 --> 00:13:31.744
I think a lot of people,
they try to make it very

00:13:31.744 --> 00:13:34.379
polished which is not
bad, but in that process

00:13:34.379 --> 00:13:35.995
you lose the humanity.

00:13:35.995 --> 00:13:37.670
It sounds like your GPS system.

00:13:37.670 --> 00:13:41.574
The next step in this
equation is when. (laughs)

00:13:41.574 --> 00:13:44.230
I think, hopefully, this
is something that I try to

00:13:44.230 --> 00:13:46.990
put into it is one of the
things that I think allowed

00:13:46.990 --> 00:13:51.366
me to thrive in math and
science and eventually

00:13:51.366 --> 00:13:53.710
even finance was I felt
like I had a really holistic

00:13:53.710 --> 00:13:56.294
understanding of things
and my basics were really,

00:13:56.294 --> 00:13:58.037
really, really solid.

00:13:58.037 --> 00:14:00.416
My basics in algebra were
really good so when I went

00:14:00.416 --> 00:14:02.502
into calculus I was like oh
this is intuitive and when

00:14:02.502 --> 00:14:04.249
I went into corporate finance,

00:14:04.249 --> 00:14:05.962
I was like oh this is intuitive.

00:14:05.962 --> 00:14:07.078
There's nothing new here.

00:14:07.078 --> 00:14:09.999
You see other really,
really smart people, they're

00:14:09.999 --> 00:14:13.203
just learning for the next
exam, memorizing formulas,

00:14:13.203 --> 00:14:14.831
then they forget it and
then when they see a related

00:14:14.831 --> 00:14:17.263
concept, it's like what's this.

00:14:17.263 --> 00:14:20.429
What I tried in those early
days for my cousins is

00:14:20.429 --> 00:14:23.224
give a sense of intuition,
draw the connections

00:14:23.224 --> 00:14:25.596
between things so that when
they see this new concept,

00:14:25.596 --> 00:14:27.088
it's not some random new concept.

00:14:27.088 --> 00:14:29.028
It's connected to everything
they learned before.

00:14:29.028 --> 00:14:30.830
I get a lot of letters.

00:14:30.830 --> 00:14:33.171
I would have assumed that
would only be appealing

00:14:33.171 --> 00:14:36.621
to the motivated kids, so
to speak, but I get a lot

00:14:36.621 --> 00:14:40.036
of letters from kids who
were traditionally disengaged

00:14:40.036 --> 00:14:41.782
or demotivated and they
said that's why I was

00:14:41.782 --> 00:14:44.419
demotivated; no one
was explaining the why.

00:14:44.419 --> 00:14:46.578
No one was giving me the connections.

00:14:46.578 --> 00:14:50.739
Hopefully that's why people have been

00:14:50.739 --> 00:14:52.165
connecting to the content.

00:14:52.165 --> 00:14:55.043
Nina: Yes. Let's talk a
little bit about virtual

00:14:55.043 --> 00:14:57.756
education and offering the types of things

00:14:57.756 --> 00:14:58.559
that you're offering.

00:14:58.559 --> 00:15:02.086
A lot of people are still a
little wary of these reforms.

00:15:02.086 --> 00:15:04.414
They see it as a mechanism
to ultimately get rid of

00:15:04.414 --> 00:15:07.187
teachers in the classroom
or reduce class sizes.

00:15:07.187 --> 00:15:09.387
You talk a little bit
about this in the book.

00:15:09.387 --> 00:15:11.520
Explain that a little bit more.

00:15:11.520 --> 00:15:13.072
Sal: Yes, yes and I think
that's a super important

00:15:13.072 --> 00:15:15.414
point because when we've
learned in the last

00:15:15.414 --> 00:15:17.359
15-20 years with the
internet, whenever people see

00:15:17.359 --> 00:15:21.111
virtual X, it's like is
that going to replace the

00:15:21.111 --> 00:15:24.198
physical; Barnes and
Noble versus Amazon.com.

00:15:24.198 --> 00:15:26.478
There's a natural contention there.

00:15:26.478 --> 00:15:29.572
That's the exact opposite
of what I think is going

00:15:29.572 --> 00:15:31.071
to happen in education.

00:15:31.071 --> 00:15:32.925
Everything we do is not

00:15:32.925 --> 00:15:34.429
going to replace a physical school.

00:15:34.429 --> 00:15:35.305
I have young kids.

00:15:35.305 --> 00:15:37.458
I want them to go to a physical school.

00:15:37.458 --> 00:15:39.156
I want them to get interaction.

00:15:39.156 --> 00:15:43.297
What it will do is, I think,
will give all of our children

00:15:43.297 --> 00:15:45.517
the experience that I
think every parent and

00:15:45.517 --> 00:15:48.347
every teacher or every
student wants to be a part of.

00:15:48.347 --> 00:15:50.362
Even now we're going through
a physical experience,

00:15:50.362 --> 00:15:52.149
but we're not leveraging the humans.

00:15:52.149 --> 00:15:53.900
We're going, but for the
most part people are sitting

00:15:53.900 --> 00:15:55.616
passively there and they're listening.

00:15:55.616 --> 00:15:58.442
It's hard for the teachers
too because it's hard to

00:15:58.442 --> 00:16:00.870
speak for 60 minutes without
getting that connection

00:16:00.870 --> 00:16:02.729
with the students.

00:16:02.729 --> 00:16:05.905
What we're advocating is
leverage tools so that you

00:16:05.905 --> 00:16:07.989
can get maybe information
delivery out of the way

00:16:07.989 --> 00:16:09.739
so that you can get some
of the problem solving

00:16:09.739 --> 00:16:11.153
out of the way.

00:16:11.153 --> 00:16:13.494
When people go and they
have class time, the scarce

00:16:13.494 --> 00:16:15.491
class time with other
human beings, then that's

00:16:15.491 --> 00:16:17.486
optimally interactive
and not interactive in

00:16:17.486 --> 00:16:19.554
the web sense, interactive
in the human sense.

00:16:19.554 --> 00:16:21.573
Class time is all conversation.

00:16:21.573 --> 00:16:24.172
Class time is all peer tutoring

00:16:24.172 --> 00:16:25.399
and working with their teacher.

00:16:25.399 --> 00:16:27.915
Class time is all doing
open-ended projects.

00:16:27.915 --> 00:16:32.987
I talk about this in the
book and I give a TED talk.

00:16:32.987 --> 00:16:35.739
The irony here is I strongly
believe, and it's not just

00:16:35.739 --> 00:16:38.365
talk again, we're seeing
this in classrooms,

00:16:38.365 --> 00:16:41.617
is that you can actually
use technology to make

00:16:41.617 --> 00:16:43.445
the classroom more human.

00:16:43.445 --> 00:16:46.325
I'm very careful; you
mentioned there is skepticism.

00:16:46.325 --> 00:16:47.399
I think there should be.

00:16:47.399 --> 00:16:48.740
I'm skeptical when
someone says hey, we just

00:16:48.740 --> 00:16:51.622
ordered 500 iPads for our
school and I say what are

00:16:51.622 --> 00:16:53.573
you going to do with it
or how are you going to

00:16:53.573 --> 00:16:54.899
integrate it into the
curriculum or how are you

00:16:54.899 --> 00:16:57.006
going to leverage it to
fundamentally transform

00:16:57.006 --> 00:16:59.702
what's going on and there usually

00:16:59.702 --> 00:17:01.206
aren't a lot of answers there.

00:17:01.206 --> 00:17:03.615
I think it is good to be
skeptical, but at the same time

00:17:03.615 --> 00:17:08.261
there is, I think, a reason for hope.

00:17:08.261 --> 00:17:11.260
Nina: How do you evaluate
the impact of your courses,

00:17:11.260 --> 00:17:14.241
since again you talk about
grades in your book and

00:17:14.241 --> 00:17:16.009
how you don't like the concept of grading.

00:17:16.009 --> 00:17:18.428
How do you know that they
have actually worked?

00:17:18.428 --> 00:17:22.264
Sal: Yes and I'll tell you
when I grew up, I remember

00:17:22.264 --> 00:17:24.092
I sometimes would meet
people who said I don't

00:17:24.092 --> 00:17:25.203
believe in grades and I
thought they were these

00:17:25.203 --> 00:17:30.573
granola bar, hippy type
people and now I think

00:17:30.573 --> 00:17:32.751
I appreciate what they were saying.

00:17:32.751 --> 00:17:35.430
Grades, normally when you
say to people who don't

00:17:35.430 --> 00:17:37.011
like grades, you really
think that they're being

00:17:37.011 --> 00:17:39.907
touchy-feely, they're not
being rigorous, but actually

00:17:39.907 --> 00:17:42.212
they're saying grades
aren't rigorous enough.

00:17:42.212 --> 00:17:44.678
Grades are this thing that
give this feeling of rigor,

00:17:44.678 --> 00:17:47.553
oh A, B, As, you really know your stuff,

00:17:47.553 --> 00:17:49.135
F, you don't know your stuff.

00:17:49.135 --> 00:17:51.636
One, they're somewhat arbitrary.

00:17:51.636 --> 00:17:53.979
It depends on the test,
depends on how it's measured.

00:17:53.979 --> 00:17:57.435
Even more than that, when
you give grades especially

00:17:57.435 --> 00:18:00.027
in the sense if you had
a C on an exam, you have

00:18:00.027 --> 00:18:02.989
obvious weaknesses,
assuming that it was even a

00:18:02.989 --> 00:18:05.715
good exam, you have obvious weaknesses.

00:18:05.715 --> 00:18:08.774
That should be used as an
assessment to say okay,

00:18:08.774 --> 00:18:10.522
you need to now improve
on those weaknesses.

00:18:10.522 --> 00:18:12.857
Before we move on to
a more advanced topic,

00:18:12.857 --> 00:18:15.292
it's common sense, get your basics down.

00:18:15.292 --> 00:18:17.525
Instead we use grades
as a value judgement.

00:18:17.525 --> 00:18:20.363
You're smart. You're dumb.
You're fast. You're slow.

00:18:20.363 --> 00:18:23.632
That's just going to be a
self-fulfilling prophecy.

00:18:23.632 --> 00:18:25.434
What we say is let's make sure

00:18:25.434 --> 00:18:27.236
everyone masters every concept.

00:18:27.236 --> 00:18:29.040
Rather than having a
superficial understanding

00:18:29.040 --> 00:18:31.792
of algebra and then moving
over onto trigonometry,

00:18:31.792 --> 00:18:34.365
make sure you really
understand algebra deeply

00:18:34.365 --> 00:18:35.956
and then trigonometry is going to make

00:18:35.956 --> 00:18:36.869
a lot more sense.

00:18:36.869 --> 00:18:38.123
It's going to be a lot
easier to learn and if you

00:18:38.123 --> 00:18:40.476
master trigonometry,
calculus is going to start

00:18:40.476 --> 00:18:43.202
seeming very intuitive.

00:18:43.202 --> 00:18:46.146
In terms of how we're doing
it, we're working with

00:18:46.146 --> 00:18:48.819
schools, most famously
Los Altos which is now

00:18:48.819 --> 00:18:52.038
using Khan Academy, it's
probably one of the best,

00:18:52.038 --> 00:18:54.207
if not the best, school
district in the country,

00:18:54.207 --> 00:18:57.793
is using Khan Academy
for 5th through 8th grade

00:18:57.793 --> 00:19:01.833
as one of the tools that
they use and there we have

00:19:01.833 --> 00:19:04.376
formal studies going on
to understand exactly

00:19:04.376 --> 00:19:08.136
how this impacting
students and teachers both

00:19:08.136 --> 00:19:10.973
objectively on things like
test scores and grades,

00:19:10.973 --> 00:19:14.617
but also subjectively.

00:19:14.617 --> 00:19:16.814
Are the teachers more
excited about their work?

00:19:16.814 --> 00:19:19.428
Are the students excited about their work?

00:19:19.428 --> 00:19:22.478
Then on top of that, we
have 3 million problems done

00:19:22.478 --> 00:19:23.847
a day on our site.

00:19:23.847 --> 00:19:25.732
We have this huge number
of students, 7 million

00:19:25.732 --> 00:19:26.930
a month using our site.

00:19:26.930 --> 00:19:28.562
We have this treasure trove of data

00:19:28.562 --> 00:19:30.194
on our side ourselves and

00:19:30.194 --> 00:19:31.827
we are building an analytics tool.

00:19:31.827 --> 00:19:32.684
Nina: Monitoring it daily.

00:19:32.684 --> 00:19:33.870
Sal: Yes. All the stuff
that all these other

00:19:33.870 --> 00:19:36.044
web companies are able
to do, we as a kind of

00:19:36.044 --> 00:19:39.211
education not-for-profit
can now do using analytics,

00:19:39.211 --> 00:19:41.429
optimizing for engagement,
see what kind of

00:19:41.429 --> 00:19:42.599
learning is going on.

00:19:42.599 --> 00:19:46.384
Nina: Great, great. Tell
me a little bit about;

00:19:46.384 --> 00:19:49.430
you gave a great historical
overview of how we came

00:19:49.430 --> 00:19:51.281
to educate students today,

00:19:51.281 --> 00:19:52.640
the way we're educating them.

00:19:52.640 --> 00:19:55.559
Did you always hold
these views and know this

00:19:55.559 --> 00:19:58.567
information before you
stumbled on the Khan Academy

00:19:58.567 --> 00:20:02.364
or this platform you
created or were these things

00:20:02.364 --> 00:20:05.113
that you studied afterwards?

00:20:05.113 --> 00:20:06.432
It just so happens that everything

00:20:06.432 --> 00:20:08.450
flows so beautifully. (laughs)

00:20:08.450 --> 00:20:09.947
Sal: It's been very serendipitous.

00:20:09.947 --> 00:20:11.788
Nina: I was curious as to what came first.

00:20:11.788 --> 00:20:13.113
Sal: It's been a combination.

00:20:13.113 --> 00:20:16.192
I actually think it's more of the latter.

00:20:16.192 --> 00:20:17.781
Obviously all of us have
spent a lot of time in

00:20:17.781 --> 00:20:19.239
the system.

00:20:19.239 --> 00:20:21.025
I think the whole time,
anybody who knew me

00:20:21.025 --> 00:20:24.116
growing up, they knew that
I was always why is this

00:20:24.116 --> 00:20:25.754
this way, why is it that why.

00:20:25.754 --> 00:20:27.507
Why can't I tutor?

00:20:27.507 --> 00:20:29.367
I used to get reprimanded
for trying to tutor.

00:20:29.367 --> 00:20:31.476
I said no, this would have been

00:20:31.476 --> 00:20:33.091
a really positive interaction.

00:20:33.091 --> 00:20:34.593
This question, did you go to college

00:20:34.593 --> 00:20:36.381
and you're like all these
people sitting in this

00:20:36.381 --> 00:20:38.707
lecture hall, is anything
really happening in here?

00:20:38.707 --> 00:20:40.794
It seems like all the
learning is happening

00:20:40.794 --> 00:20:43.809
in the cram session three
days before the final.

00:20:43.809 --> 00:20:45.388
There were always these
ideas and then obviously

00:20:45.388 --> 00:20:46.733
when I started working with my cousins.

00:20:46.733 --> 00:20:49.102
I started seeing my cousins
were motivated, they were

00:20:49.102 --> 00:20:51.316
for the most part good
students, but they were having

00:20:51.316 --> 00:20:53.245
these huge gaps in their knowledge.

00:20:53.245 --> 00:20:54.606
They weren't learning things intuitive.

00:20:54.606 --> 00:20:55.763
Nina: It's called Swiss cheese learning.

00:20:55.763 --> 00:20:57.187
Sal: Swiss cheese learning.

00:20:57.187 --> 00:21:00.023
I, in very pragmatic ways,
started building these

00:21:00.023 --> 00:21:03.086
tools and it was really
a process of discovery

00:21:03.086 --> 00:21:04.772
of teachers emailing me
saying hey, we're using it

00:21:04.772 --> 00:21:06.777
this way or we're using it that way.

00:21:06.777 --> 00:21:09.872
It's a combination of these
instincts of how did I learn,

00:21:09.872 --> 00:21:11.879
how do other people that
I know who learn things

00:21:11.879 --> 00:21:14.168
holistically, how did they
learn, what am I seeing

00:21:14.168 --> 00:21:18.130
with my cousins, what
are teachers telling me.

00:21:18.130 --> 00:21:20.566
As Khan Academy got more
traction, I started having

00:21:20.566 --> 00:21:22.606
people tell me about a lot of this stuff.

00:21:22.606 --> 00:21:24.143
I knew a little bit
about the history before.

00:21:24.143 --> 00:21:27.810
I'd heard about this whole
Committee of Ten on 1890.

00:21:27.810 --> 00:21:31.614
Someone told me about that
in high school, but it was

00:21:31.614 --> 00:21:35.039
interesting that even the
research, the reason why I

00:21:35.039 --> 00:21:37.022
made the videos so short
was because YouTube limited

00:21:37.022 --> 00:21:39.906
me to ten minutes but then
I used to have researchers

00:21:39.906 --> 00:21:41.917
telling that no, there's
actually cognitive research

00:21:41.917 --> 00:21:45.295
that shows that's where a
lot of research from the book

00:21:45.295 --> 00:21:48.169
comes from, actually
people, especially dense

00:21:48.169 --> 00:21:49.705
academic content, can't
pay attention for more than

00:21:49.705 --> 00:21:51.014
ten or fifteen minutes.

00:21:51.014 --> 00:21:54.204
It starts as wow, why are
we do these, why are we

00:21:54.204 --> 00:21:56.690
using class time, this time
with human beings for these

00:21:56.690 --> 00:21:58.939
hour long lectures,
sometimes 90 minute lectures.

00:21:58.939 --> 00:22:01.048
Can't we get people to interact more?

00:22:01.048 --> 00:22:03.521
The more I did research,
a lot of these basic

00:22:03.521 --> 00:22:06.014
common sense ideas gelled
with research and that's

00:22:06.014 --> 00:22:07.023
when you feel best about it.

00:22:07.023 --> 00:22:10.563
It's weird when research
tells you something very

00:22:10.563 --> 00:22:12.440
non-intuitive, but here
it's telling you something

00:22:12.440 --> 00:22:16.683
very, very, very intuitive
and the only hard to graph

00:22:16.683 --> 00:22:18.019
thing is that we're very indoctrinated

00:22:18.019 --> 00:22:19.824
into a strange model.

00:22:19.824 --> 00:22:22.683
Nina: Yes, yes. It all makes sense.

00:22:22.683 --> 00:22:24.208
Tell me a little bit
about your own education.

00:22:24.208 --> 00:22:27.284
Something despite the
regimented system that you grew

00:22:27.284 --> 00:22:29.186
up in, something must have gone right.

00:22:29.186 --> 00:22:31.688
Was it a teacher? Was it
your parents you think who

00:22:31.688 --> 00:22:35.863
built this sense of inquisitiveness?

00:22:35.863 --> 00:22:39.971
Did you go to a particular
type of school that

00:22:39.971 --> 00:22:42.470
was open to nurturing
you as an individual and

00:22:42.470 --> 00:22:46.085
paying attention to your specific needs?

00:22:46.085 --> 00:22:48.691
Did none of these things work?

00:22:48.691 --> 00:22:51.694
Sal: Yes, yes. I would
be delusional, although

00:22:51.694 --> 00:22:53.522
I am sometimes delusional,
if I were to say none on

00:22:53.522 --> 00:22:55.167
of that stuff played in.

00:22:55.167 --> 00:22:57.101
I think there was probably
two, I mean there's probably

00:22:57.101 --> 00:22:58.985
a bunch of different
factors and I'm probably

00:22:58.985 --> 00:23:00.270
forgetting some of them.

00:23:00.270 --> 00:23:02.936
One, I was blessed to have
an older sister who was

00:23:02.936 --> 00:23:05.913
a very good student so
I think that projected.

00:23:05.913 --> 00:23:08.421
When I would walk into a
classroom, teachers would

00:23:08.421 --> 00:23:12.792
remember my sister and say
oh, you're Farrah's brother.

00:23:12.792 --> 00:23:15.171
You must be and I was
like in speech therapy

00:23:15.171 --> 00:23:17.220
and stuff, but they would project that.

00:23:17.220 --> 00:23:19.168
There's actually studies
now that show that that

00:23:19.168 --> 00:23:21.090
projection has huge
implications for your own

00:23:21.090 --> 00:23:23.758
self-esteem so that was luck.

00:23:23.758 --> 00:23:27.316
On top of that, I went
to just, I would say, it

00:23:27.316 --> 00:23:29.339
was a public school in Jefferson Parish.

00:23:29.339 --> 00:23:31.010
Public schools in Jefferson
Parish, right outside

00:23:31.010 --> 00:23:33.478
of New Orleans, I would
say it was the average

00:23:33.478 --> 00:23:36.029
American public schools, all of them.

00:23:36.029 --> 00:23:37.927
Elementary, middle and high school.

00:23:37.927 --> 00:23:41.090
There were some incredible teachers there.

00:23:41.090 --> 00:23:44.703
I think in high school in
particular Mr. Hernandez,

00:23:44.703 --> 00:23:45.796
Miss Kennedy.

00:23:45.796 --> 00:23:47.670
Miss Kennedy was the
journalism teacher and actually

00:23:47.670 --> 00:23:48.957
I would say that's where
a lot of the ideas,

00:23:48.957 --> 00:23:51.260
class should not be a lecture.

00:23:51.260 --> 00:23:53.259
Class should be working
alongside the teacher.

00:23:53.259 --> 00:23:55.455
It was journalism class
so we had a product,

00:23:55.455 --> 00:23:57.387
a creative product, a
newspaper to work on.

00:23:57.387 --> 00:23:59.211
I was the art editor and
she would give us feedback

00:23:59.211 --> 00:24:01.643
and she was like our senior peer, and I

00:24:01.643 --> 00:24:03.176
remember those interactions
and a lot of the experience

00:24:03.176 --> 00:24:04.751
I got from journalism,
I still think about when

00:24:04.751 --> 00:24:08.432
I'm working on Khan Academy.

00:24:08.432 --> 00:24:09.901
I think early in my schooling,
I think this was key

00:24:09.901 --> 00:24:13.859
and also lucky, I got into
- I don't what they call

00:24:13.859 --> 00:24:16.810
it now - these GT programs
and what they did is

00:24:16.810 --> 00:24:19.421
you have this very structured
Prussian curriculum

00:24:19.421 --> 00:24:22.615
for most of the day, but
then one day a week they

00:24:22.615 --> 00:24:24.428
take you out of a different
classroom and they

00:24:24.428 --> 00:24:26.118
take you into these GT classrooms.

00:24:26.118 --> 00:24:28.517
There, you'd go into
this classroom which is

00:24:28.517 --> 00:24:31.086
essentially the kind of
classroom ideally everyone

00:24:31.086 --> 00:24:33.379
should have where you
have this, it was actually

00:24:33.379 --> 00:24:34.887
Miss Rucell and Miss Krause.

00:24:34.887 --> 00:24:38.082
These two teachers and
they had PhDs in education.

00:24:38.082 --> 00:24:42.047
I remember the first day
walking into GT and Miss Rucell

00:24:42.047 --> 00:24:43.937
said what do you want to do.

00:24:43.937 --> 00:24:49.175
I was like 8 and I was like
I like to draw and then

00:24:49.175 --> 00:24:51.476
she says well you should
draw more then, but she

00:24:51.476 --> 00:24:53.418
would introduce me to these
things, different styles,

00:24:53.418 --> 00:24:55.426
different tools to draw.

00:24:55.426 --> 00:24:56.891
What else are you interested in?

00:24:56.891 --> 00:25:00.194
I was like I like puzzles
and she's like well here

00:25:00.194 --> 00:25:01.362
are some puzzles and she would give me

00:25:01.362 --> 00:25:02.518
these brain teasers.

00:25:02.518 --> 00:25:04.728
She was mentoring me and
it was self-paced and I

00:25:04.728 --> 00:25:06.177
was able to go at my own
pace and there were other

00:25:06.177 --> 00:25:07.622
kids working on interesting
things and I would get

00:25:07.622 --> 00:25:09.629
inspired by them, sometimes
we would work on things.

00:25:09.629 --> 00:25:12.529
I think we needed that breathing room.

00:25:12.529 --> 00:25:16.371
I wonder if I didn't have
that experience early on

00:25:16.371 --> 00:25:19.232
in my life whether I would
have had the ability to

00:25:19.232 --> 00:25:21.725
self-direct or have the ability to say

00:25:21.725 --> 00:25:24.078
let me solve that problem.

00:25:24.078 --> 00:25:26.212
That's an interesting thing to tackle.

00:25:26.212 --> 00:25:27.264
Nina: Right.

00:25:27.264 --> 00:25:29.256
Along those lines, do
you have any advice for

00:25:29.256 --> 00:25:33.021
parents out there, first
graders, second graders,

00:25:33.021 --> 00:25:34.571
and I'm asking you this
because in your book, you

00:25:34.571 --> 00:25:37.314
also highlight how a lot
of students in southeast

00:25:37.314 --> 00:25:41.480
Asia go to school in order
to show off what they know,

00:25:41.480 --> 00:25:43.495
not necessarily to learn in school.

00:25:43.495 --> 00:25:46.414
Are there habits that you
think parents can start

00:25:46.414 --> 00:25:49.706
to put in place early on,
despite how schools are

00:25:49.706 --> 00:25:51.383
approaching education?

00:25:51.383 --> 00:25:53.250
Sal: Yes and take everything
I say with a grain of salt.

00:25:53.250 --> 00:25:55.047
I have a 3-year-old and
a 1-year-old so maybe I

00:25:55.047 --> 00:25:56.858
should be getting advice
from the parents of 7- or

00:25:56.858 --> 00:25:58.742
8-year-olds.

00:25:58.742 --> 00:26:01.590
I'm trying to get my
1-year-old off of a pacifier.

00:26:01.590 --> 00:26:03.161
Nina: You know iPads are very popular.

00:26:03.161 --> 00:26:04.572
Sal: No, you're absolutely right.

00:26:04.572 --> 00:26:08.095
My sense, having gone
through the system and even

00:26:08.095 --> 00:26:10.245
observing, we're working
with a lot of teachers,

00:26:10.245 --> 00:26:11.353
we're working with a lot of schools now,

00:26:11.353 --> 00:26:13.571
I would say there's a
couple dimensions here.

00:26:13.571 --> 00:26:15.192
I think it is true.

00:26:15.192 --> 00:26:17.572
Asians, whether it's
East Asians, South Asian,

00:26:17.572 --> 00:26:22.616
there is a culture of school
is where you go to show

00:26:22.616 --> 00:26:25.192
what you've already learned
at home and I think that

00:26:25.192 --> 00:26:27.776
gives those students an
advantage of having this

00:26:27.776 --> 00:26:32.832
kind of buffer of they're
learning stuff maybe ahead.

00:26:32.832 --> 00:26:34.646
I'm not saying that
necessarily has to be the way,

00:26:34.646 --> 00:26:37.798
but that is a way to ensure
that your student in the

00:26:37.798 --> 00:26:40.586
Prussian model doesn't
fall behind and as soon as

00:26:40.586 --> 00:26:43.210
they fall behind, all of
these negative self-perception

00:26:43.210 --> 00:26:45.000
things and they start
to reinforce each other.

00:26:45.000 --> 00:26:50.255
I'll tell you what I would
do with my own children.

00:26:50.255 --> 00:26:53.065
I would do some combination
of engaging them with

00:26:53.065 --> 00:26:56.124
a lot of the content before
it becomes stressful.

00:26:56.124 --> 00:27:00.725
When I was teaching Nadia
algebra when she was in

00:27:00.725 --> 00:27:02.362
algebra class, it was
stressful for her because

00:27:02.362 --> 00:27:04.811
she was like I need to catch
up, I have an exam on it.

00:27:04.811 --> 00:27:06.951
When I started teaching
algebra to her younger brother,

00:27:06.951 --> 00:27:09.523
who's in 5th grade, he
thought it was fun because

00:27:09.523 --> 00:27:10.446
there's no stress here.

00:27:10.446 --> 00:27:12.108
It was just this fun thing
his cousin was teaching.

00:27:12.108 --> 00:27:14.845
At least expose your kids
to the ideas of algebra

00:27:14.845 --> 00:27:17.365
and physics and biology
and chemistry early on so

00:27:17.365 --> 00:27:19.551
when they see it in school,

00:27:19.551 --> 00:27:21.212
they've already had some exposure.

00:27:21.212 --> 00:27:24.884
The other thing I would say
is don't over schedule them.

00:27:24.884 --> 00:27:29.518
I think sometimes the same
parents that would do the

00:27:29.518 --> 00:27:31.215
teaching ahead of time, at
the same time would also

00:27:31.215 --> 00:27:32.880
you have piano lessons,
you have soccer lessons,

00:27:32.880 --> 00:27:33.851
you have everything.

00:27:33.851 --> 00:27:37.604
I think there's value there
definitely but if it's

00:27:37.604 --> 00:27:39.481
complete over-scheduling,
you have the loss of the

00:27:39.481 --> 00:27:43.482
time for the child to
develop their own creativity.

00:27:43.482 --> 00:27:44.849
Kind of what I had in that GT class.

00:27:44.849 --> 00:27:48.032
Frankly in the '80s, I was
a latch-key child where

00:27:48.032 --> 00:27:51.930
mom, she worked these
odd jobs and come home at

00:27:51.930 --> 00:27:53.994
6:00 or 7:00 so my sister
and I, we would just hangout.

00:27:53.994 --> 00:27:57.439
Some of it was wasted watching
TV, but a lot of it was

00:27:57.439 --> 00:27:59.759
I want to build something
or I want to draw or

00:27:59.759 --> 00:28:01.613
we would make up games
and stuff like that.

00:28:01.613 --> 00:28:04.548
Kids need that, they need
that free space and maybe

00:28:04.548 --> 00:28:06.625
if they are blowing it
all on video games or

00:28:06.625 --> 00:28:08.601
watching TV, you need to
push them a little bit

00:28:08.601 --> 00:28:10.924
or do something creative with them.

00:28:10.924 --> 00:28:12.931
They need that time for creativity.

00:28:12.931 --> 00:28:15.018
The last thing I would
recommend is that the parents

00:28:15.018 --> 00:28:17.731
themselves engage in learning because

00:28:17.731 --> 00:28:18.934
you set that example.

00:28:18.934 --> 00:28:21.600
If you are 40 or 50-years-old
and you're going back

00:28:21.600 --> 00:28:24.782
and learning algebra and
cosmology or English Lit.,

00:28:24.782 --> 00:28:26.230
it's a huge signal for students.

00:28:26.230 --> 00:28:27.349
Nina: Right, right.

00:28:27.349 --> 00:28:29.983
Let's talk about your vision
for the ideal classroom

00:28:29.983 --> 00:28:33.281
or this futuristic vision
that you outline here

00:28:33.281 --> 00:28:35.444
about what the school of
tomorrow should look like

00:28:35.444 --> 00:28:40.012
which is a life long learning
approach to education.

00:28:40.012 --> 00:28:42.796
You also talk about the college
of tomorrow to look like.

00:28:42.796 --> 00:28:45.758
I was fascinated by this,
but let's talk just about

00:28:45.758 --> 00:28:48.291
schooling, your notions
of class size, the ideal

00:28:48.291 --> 00:28:52.629
classroom could potentially
have 100 students in it

00:28:52.629 --> 00:28:54.549
with four instructors roaming around

00:28:54.549 --> 00:28:56.476
and helping students.

00:28:56.476 --> 00:28:58.229
We talked a little bit
about grades already,

00:28:58.229 --> 00:28:59.600
but testing.

00:28:59.600 --> 00:29:01.783
This is one of those topics
that comes up a lot here

00:29:01.783 --> 00:29:05.355
in Washington and with the
discussions on Capitol Hill.

00:29:05.355 --> 00:29:10.250
How would you describe
that vision for us and you

00:29:10.250 --> 00:29:11.951
also talk about how you
would get rid of summer

00:29:11.951 --> 00:29:14.359
vacations which is probably
not going to be popular?

00:29:14.359 --> 00:29:16.683
Yes, let's dive into this a bit.

00:29:16.683 --> 00:29:17.871
Sal: Yes, no there's a lot there.

00:29:17.871 --> 00:29:22.017
The first dimension is once
you remove lecture from

00:29:22.017 --> 00:29:24.851
class time, you say class
time is time for interaction,

00:29:24.851 --> 00:29:26.294
you can have students
working at their own pace,

00:29:26.294 --> 00:29:28.008
allows you to rethink everything.

00:29:28.008 --> 00:29:29.903
A lot of the concepts in this book

00:29:29.903 --> 00:29:31.055
and a lot of these are happening.

00:29:31.055 --> 00:29:32.213
There are schools that
we're working with that are

00:29:32.213 --> 00:29:34.238
doing these things.

00:29:34.238 --> 00:29:37.102
They are experiments, but
they're experiments that

00:29:37.102 --> 00:29:40.343
all the research and all
the intuition point in

00:29:40.343 --> 00:29:41.510
that direction.

00:29:41.510 --> 00:29:43.346
Teaching is, for the most
part, a solitary profession.

00:29:43.346 --> 00:29:44.760
You're the only teacher in the room.

00:29:44.760 --> 00:29:46.520
Nina: It's a lonely profession, yes.

00:29:46.520 --> 00:29:47.643
Sal: It's lonely.

00:29:47.643 --> 00:29:50.432
You can have 100 students,
you're not changing the

00:29:50.432 --> 00:29:53.003
students/teacher ratio,
you might even improve it,

00:29:53.003 --> 00:29:54.819
but you now have four
teachers in the same room.

00:29:54.819 --> 00:29:56.710
Now if one of them gets
sick, students don't ahve

00:29:56.710 --> 00:29:58.122
a substitute teacher.

00:29:58.122 --> 00:29:59.370
Different students are
going to connect with

00:29:59.370 --> 00:30:00.120
different teachers.

00:30:00.120 --> 00:30:01.597
They can mentor each other;
they can do group things

00:30:01.597 --> 00:30:03.096
with teachers together.

00:30:03.096 --> 00:30:04.713
There's a whole dimension
that you could add.

00:30:04.713 --> 00:30:07.515
You could have a physics
teacher, a math teacher,

00:30:07.515 --> 00:30:09.769
a chemistry teacher and
a biology teacher all

00:30:09.769 --> 00:30:11.427
teaching simultaneously
so students understand all

00:30:11.427 --> 00:30:14.460
these sciences and math blend together.

00:30:14.460 --> 00:30:16.939
They're not these siloed
subjects so they get

00:30:16.939 --> 00:30:18.382
a holistic understanding.

00:30:18.382 --> 00:30:22.840
The tests themselves, you
need some aspect of testing,

00:30:22.840 --> 00:30:25.232
but you should be very
skeptical of testing because

00:30:25.232 --> 00:30:29.233
all tests measure what
they test and there's many

00:30:29.233 --> 00:30:31.684
more facets to a human being than that.

00:30:31.684 --> 00:30:36.016
The dimensions, there could
be some testing to make

00:30:36.016 --> 00:30:38.449
sure that students are
getting core competency

00:30:38.449 --> 00:30:41.068
and some core skills, but
the more important skills,

00:30:41.068 --> 00:30:43.878
which I think are completely
unmeasured right now,

00:30:43.878 --> 00:30:45.618
are creativity and you
can never give someone a

00:30:45.618 --> 00:30:48.294
creativity score but you can have someone

00:30:48.294 --> 00:30:50.949
generate a portfolio of creative works.

00:30:50.949 --> 00:30:54.497
We, as an employer, we're
hiring engineers and we

00:30:54.497 --> 00:30:57.011
get these people with
great GPAs from top schools

00:30:57.011 --> 00:30:59.848
in the country and say
what have you created.

00:30:59.848 --> 00:31:02.259
That's what engineering
is, building new things,

00:31:02.259 --> 00:31:04.305
and they haven't created
anything because they've

00:31:04.305 --> 00:31:07.093
been on the treadmill the whole time,

00:31:07.093 --> 00:31:08.683
just trying to finish problem sets

00:31:08.683 --> 00:31:10.896
and they're very, very, smart people.

00:31:10.896 --> 00:31:13.178
The ideal is that students
over their careers can

00:31:13.178 --> 00:31:14.516
show what they've created.

00:31:14.516 --> 00:31:16.183
It's not like they write
a paper, it gets graded,

00:31:16.183 --> 00:31:17.341
and it gets thrown away.

00:31:17.341 --> 00:31:19.907
They write a paper, it
gets graded and they keep

00:31:19.907 --> 00:31:21.076
working on the paper;
they keep developing it.

00:31:21.076 --> 00:31:22.826
When they're 18, they have a novel done.

00:31:22.826 --> 00:31:25.014
They have a bunch of
papers on policy done.

00:31:25.014 --> 00:31:26.654
They can show people this is my work.

00:31:26.654 --> 00:31:28.449
They have computer programs written; they

00:31:28.449 --> 00:31:31.600
build robots and on top of
that, and this is another

00:31:31.600 --> 00:31:37.628
dimension that's completely
missed in the Prussian

00:31:37.628 --> 00:31:41.829
model so to speak, is I think
in any field, the people

00:31:41.829 --> 00:31:44.410
you want to work with the
most are the people who

00:31:44.410 --> 00:31:47.233
have deep subject matter
expertise but are also always

00:31:47.233 --> 00:31:49.317
willing to help others and
they have that communication

00:31:49.317 --> 00:31:51.730
and that ability to empathize.

00:31:51.730 --> 00:31:55.344
In our current system, we
make everyone very focused

00:31:55.344 --> 00:31:56.574
on themselves.

00:31:56.574 --> 00:31:57.512
What are your grades?

00:31:57.512 --> 00:31:58.867
Are you going to pass a test?

00:31:58.867 --> 00:32:00.619
Cram for the next exam.

00:32:00.619 --> 00:32:02.500
In the model that we're
describing, that we're

00:32:02.500 --> 00:32:04.116
starting to see in a lot of schools, let's

00:32:04.116 --> 00:32:05.790
focus everyone on each other.

00:32:05.790 --> 00:32:07.094
Yes, you go at your own
pace, you might be racing

00:32:07.094 --> 00:32:08.545
ahead and that's great.

00:32:08.545 --> 00:32:11.014
You're stimulated, you're
engaged, but you also

00:32:11.014 --> 00:32:12.890
have a chance to re-engage
with students who might

00:32:12.890 --> 00:32:14.706
be having difficulty
and there's two things.

00:32:14.706 --> 00:32:16.134
One, you're going to
be helping that student

00:32:16.134 --> 00:32:19.044
but even better when you
explain that, hopefully,

00:32:19.044 --> 00:32:21.044
and you develop your ability to explain,

00:32:21.044 --> 00:32:22.596
you learn the material better,

00:32:22.596 --> 00:32:24.346
and you'll learn to communicate,

00:32:24.346 --> 00:32:25.671
you'll learn to empathize and that

00:32:25.671 --> 00:32:27.054
actually is measurable.

00:32:27.054 --> 00:32:28.425
You can have students rate each other.

00:32:28.425 --> 00:32:30.648
You can have people write
assessments for each other.

00:32:30.648 --> 00:32:32.259
Oh, he understood this
stuff, but he spoke a little

00:32:32.259 --> 00:32:35.322
fast and you can develop that aspect.

00:32:35.322 --> 00:32:39.096
I'd imagine that transcript
of the future, and I say the

00:32:39.096 --> 00:32:43.114
future, that future is
now, is yes you would

00:32:43.114 --> 00:32:44.012
have your test scores.

00:32:44.012 --> 00:32:46.091
Your test scores are actual competency;

00:32:46.091 --> 00:32:46.947
it wouldn't be grades.

00:32:46.947 --> 00:32:48.362
It would be like yes, I understand algebra

00:32:48.362 --> 00:32:49.753
and I've renewed it.

00:32:49.753 --> 00:32:51.078
I've renewed that I know algebra well.

00:32:51.078 --> 00:32:52.783
I know cosmology and I'm a writer

00:32:52.783 --> 00:32:55.129
and here's my writings.

00:32:55.129 --> 00:32:56.828
You have a portfolio of
your creative works in

00:32:56.828 --> 00:33:00.715
multi-dimensions and you
have reviews from people

00:33:00.715 --> 00:33:03.724
that you've helped saying
great person to work with,

00:33:03.724 --> 00:33:05.173
really understood the subject matter,

00:33:05.173 --> 00:33:07.349
really able to communicate
well and those are

00:33:07.349 --> 00:33:08.970
the things that I think
anyone would actually

00:33:08.970 --> 00:33:11.091
care about more than just test scores.

00:33:11.091 --> 00:33:12.974
Nina: Right, but let's
talk a little bit about

00:33:12.974 --> 00:33:15.292
what happens in this
classroom or school in terms

00:33:15.292 --> 00:33:17.091
in terms of subjects.

00:33:17.091 --> 00:33:20.582
You believe that right
now you have to take math,

00:33:20.582 --> 00:33:24.106
you have to take English
language arts, you start

00:33:24.106 --> 00:33:26.317
science at a certain point in time.

00:33:26.317 --> 00:33:29.238
Do you believe that all
these basics should also

00:33:29.238 --> 00:33:31.433
be thought in this
school and at what point,

00:33:31.433 --> 00:33:35.171
another question that
I wanted to ask is do

00:33:35.171 --> 00:33:36.787
you believe that all
children can learn unless

00:33:36.787 --> 00:33:38.095
they have a serious disability?

00:33:38.095 --> 00:33:40.853
Can they all progress to
the levels that you have

00:33:40.853 --> 00:33:44.374
progressed to if they
simply learn and master

00:33:44.374 --> 00:33:46.976
and show an interest really
in the subject matter

00:33:46.976 --> 00:33:50.312
that they're studying?

00:33:50.312 --> 00:33:52.982
Specifically vis'a'vie,
the STEM fields which are

00:33:52.982 --> 00:33:55.152
science, technology, engineering, and math

00:33:55.152 --> 00:33:58.277
which are areas kids tend
not to get interested in.

00:33:58.277 --> 00:34:00.847
Is it just because they
haven't mastered it well

00:34:00.847 --> 00:34:03.929
and been pushed to
understand it early on or

00:34:03.929 --> 00:34:06.830
are there limitations
perhaps in how we are

00:34:06.830 --> 00:34:08.359
currently trying to get students

00:34:08.359 --> 00:34:09.914
to learn these subjects?

00:34:09.914 --> 00:34:12.537
Sal: Yes, so on the latter
question if you would

00:34:12.537 --> 00:34:14.265
have asked me 20 years
ago, I would have said yeah

00:34:14.265 --> 00:34:16.008
maybe certain people
are predisposed to math

00:34:16.008 --> 00:34:18.510
and science and other
people aren't and that made

00:34:18.510 --> 00:34:19.885
me feel good because I
was one of those people

00:34:19.885 --> 00:34:20.756
who were predisposed.

00:34:20.756 --> 00:34:22.800
It made me feel like I
was meant to be there;

00:34:22.800 --> 00:34:25.888
it wasn't luck, but my
experience with my cousins,

00:34:25.888 --> 00:34:28.021
Nadia in particular but
other cousins, and then

00:34:28.021 --> 00:34:29.309
what we're seeing schools.

00:34:29.309 --> 00:34:31.922
The schools that are
transitioning to this type

00:34:31.922 --> 00:34:33.591
of a model where all the
students are learning

00:34:33.591 --> 00:34:35.974
at their own pace,
building their foundations,

00:34:35.974 --> 00:34:39.516
we're seeing day five, yes.

00:34:39.516 --> 00:34:40.515
Some kids have raced ahead.

00:34:40.515 --> 00:34:42.430
Well those are the gifted
kids and some kids are

00:34:42.430 --> 00:34:44.820
falling behind; well maybe
they need to be remediated.

00:34:44.820 --> 00:34:46.948
Traditional model, you
would separate them and you

00:34:46.948 --> 00:34:49.318
would tell these kids
you're smart and you would

00:34:49.318 --> 00:34:51.372
tell these kids, either
explicitly or implicitly,

00:34:51.372 --> 00:34:53.323
you're not as smart.

00:34:53.323 --> 00:34:55.136
What we're seeing is if
you keep them together,

00:34:55.136 --> 00:34:57.096
but you allow them to work
at their own pace so that

00:34:57.096 --> 00:34:59.681
they're engaged, they have
mentorship from each other

00:34:59.681 --> 00:35:01.631
and the teacher, many times it's actually

00:35:01.631 --> 00:35:02.780
quite hard to predict,
we're trying to predict but

00:35:02.780 --> 00:35:04.887
it's very hard, some of these students

00:35:04.887 --> 00:35:06.295
were falling behind.

00:35:06.295 --> 00:35:08.594
Maybe it's an algebra class
and some of them didn't

00:35:08.594 --> 00:35:09.761
know multiplication well.

00:35:09.761 --> 00:35:11.096
Some of them didn't know
how to add fractions.

00:35:11.096 --> 00:35:12.346
You give them an
opportunity to really build

00:35:12.346 --> 00:35:14.950
that foundation on negative
numbers,multiplication,

00:35:14.950 --> 00:35:16.473
exponents, whatever it might be,

00:35:16.473 --> 00:35:17.854
and these kids race ahead.

00:35:17.854 --> 00:35:19.928
They're problem wasn't that they had some

00:35:19.928 --> 00:35:22.386
cognitive inability to understand algebra.

00:35:22.386 --> 00:35:24.193
The problem was they're
sitting in an algebra class

00:35:24.193 --> 00:35:26.442
and for some reason they
didn't understand how to

00:35:26.442 --> 00:35:28.283
multiply or they didn't know
how to add fractions and

00:35:28.283 --> 00:35:30.341
then you're just going to feel
silly in an algebra class.

00:35:30.341 --> 00:35:32.508
You'll disengage really just to protect

00:35:32.508 --> 00:35:34.558
your own self-esteem.

00:35:34.558 --> 00:35:38.283
I'm actually now more
and more convinced that

00:35:38.283 --> 00:35:42.515
pretty much everyone,
barring certain exceptions,

00:35:42.515 --> 00:35:44.511
could - we don't know
where; we're still learning;

00:35:44.511 --> 00:35:47.054
we don't know - progress far ahead

00:35:47.054 --> 00:35:49.741
and we're seeing it in these classrooms.

00:35:49.741 --> 00:35:51.264
We traditionally think
motivated kids, maybe

00:35:51.264 --> 00:35:53.299
that's 20% of kids, but as
soon as you allow people

00:35:53.299 --> 00:35:56.076
to engage and fill in gaps
without feeling embarrassed,

00:35:56.076 --> 00:35:58.716
you start seeing it's
not 20%; it's 80 or 90%

00:35:58.716 --> 00:36:01.315
of kids can start to feel engaged.

00:36:01.315 --> 00:36:05.108
In terms of the first
question about what subjects,

00:36:05.108 --> 00:36:07.525
I think it is interesting
and I talk a little bit

00:36:07.525 --> 00:36:10.864
about it is the subjects that are

00:36:10.864 --> 00:36:12.396
taught now are somewhat arbitrary.

00:36:12.396 --> 00:36:15.043
They were decided in 1892
by the Committee of Ten,

00:36:15.043 --> 00:36:18.631
male university presidents
who didn't know about;

00:36:18.631 --> 00:36:20.741
this was before the
Federal Reserve existed,

00:36:20.741 --> 00:36:22.542
the interstate highways
existed, knowledge of DNA

00:36:22.542 --> 00:36:24.540
and a whole bunch of other stuff, and they

00:36:24.540 --> 00:36:28.364
decided that at age 14
you should learn algebra,

00:36:28.364 --> 00:36:30.374
at age 15 you should
learn geometry, at age 16

00:36:30.374 --> 00:36:31.874
you should learn trigonometry.

00:36:31.874 --> 00:36:33.163
You should learn physics your

00:36:33.163 --> 00:36:34.566
senior year in high school.

00:36:34.566 --> 00:36:37.203
That's when it was decided
and it hasn't changed since.

00:36:37.203 --> 00:36:38.975
I love all those subjects,
I think they're all

00:36:38.975 --> 00:36:43.219
fascinating, but I think
there are obvious questions.

00:36:43.219 --> 00:36:44.390
Should there be more statistics?

00:36:44.390 --> 00:36:46.065
Is statistics more valuable than calculus

00:36:46.065 --> 00:36:47.685
or at least as valuable?

00:36:47.685 --> 00:36:51.025
Should there be some
knowledge of economics?

00:36:51.025 --> 00:36:53.042
Who knows what it would be.

00:36:53.042 --> 00:36:55.372
It's for society to decide,
but the general idea

00:36:55.372 --> 00:37:00.334
is at minimum should be
rethought in the last 120 years.

00:37:00.334 --> 00:37:01.905
There are grounds, the world has changed.

00:37:01.905 --> 00:37:04.636
We should think more about
what these subjects are.

00:37:04.636 --> 00:37:07.674
Even more I think and you eluded to this,

00:37:07.674 --> 00:37:10.888
should they even be divvied
up in this siloed subjects?

00:37:10.888 --> 00:37:13.507
These siloed subjects,
we're indoctrinated into it

00:37:13.507 --> 00:37:16.239
so it's hard for us to
break our minds from it.

00:37:16.239 --> 00:37:17.517
This is the factory model.

00:37:17.517 --> 00:37:21.633
This is you're at this
machine in the factory so this

00:37:21.633 --> 00:37:23.886
is what will be poured into the product.

00:37:23.886 --> 00:37:25.642
Okay, now you're going to
have the paint applied to you.

00:37:25.642 --> 00:37:27.478
You're going to have the
chemistry applied to you.

00:37:27.478 --> 00:37:30.148
Now you move on and for
some people that might

00:37:30.148 --> 00:37:31.325
chip a little bit; that's fine.

00:37:31.325 --> 00:37:33.440
They'll be a cheaper
product at the end, but the

00:37:33.440 --> 00:37:40.076
reality is chemistry is
halfway in between physics

00:37:40.076 --> 00:37:42.500
and biology and physics
is halfway in between

00:37:42.500 --> 00:37:45.827
chemistry and pure
mathematics and all of them

00:37:45.827 --> 00:37:48.374
actually have an aspect
of philosophy to them.

00:37:48.374 --> 00:37:51.003
All of them have an aspect
of aesthetics to them

00:37:51.003 --> 00:37:53.334
and whatever else and
writing can be critical and

00:37:53.334 --> 00:37:56.336
logical thinking is across all programs.

00:37:56.336 --> 00:37:59.048
You could have something
like logic which is

00:37:59.048 --> 00:38:00.801
across everything.

00:38:00.801 --> 00:38:04.987
I think the reality
we're moving to is yes,

00:38:04.987 --> 00:38:06.683
you will show competency in things.

00:38:06.683 --> 00:38:09.354
Yes, I understand this
domain well so you can go

00:38:09.354 --> 00:38:13.103
take an exam and then
renew that exam to show

00:38:13.103 --> 00:38:15.238
that yes, I still understand
that topic but while

00:38:15.238 --> 00:38:17.619
you're in school, some might
be preparation for that

00:38:17.619 --> 00:38:20.399
particular competency,
but most of the time

00:38:20.399 --> 00:38:23.459
we'll be blending it
where you're not working

00:38:23.459 --> 00:38:24.874
to pass an assessment;

00:38:24.874 --> 00:38:26.417
you're working to create things.

00:38:26.417 --> 00:38:28.577
In the process of creating
things, whether it might

00:38:28.577 --> 00:38:31.051
be a novel or a robot or a business,

00:38:31.051 --> 00:38:33.645
you're integrating all of these things.

00:38:33.645 --> 00:38:35.588
Anyone who's started a
business, if you're in a

00:38:35.588 --> 00:38:38.587
tech business, there's
art and design, there's

00:38:38.587 --> 00:38:41.381
technology, there's quantitative
thinking and there's

00:38:41.381 --> 00:38:43.637
writing and there's just
human skills and you

00:38:43.637 --> 00:38:44.798
need to integrate them.

00:38:44.798 --> 00:38:47.084
That's what actually
matters in the real world.

00:38:47.084 --> 00:38:50.977
When you break yourself
from this assembly line

00:38:50.977 --> 00:38:53.882
model, you give yourself the freedom

00:38:53.882 --> 00:38:56.138
for people to pursue these type of things.

00:38:56.138 --> 00:38:59.817
Nina: Why not create a Khan
Academy charter school?

00:38:59.817 --> 00:39:01.874
Why not a Khan Academy private school?

00:39:01.874 --> 00:39:03.757
Sal: Yes.

00:39:03.757 --> 00:39:06.333
Nina: I'm sure you've
thought of it at least once.

00:39:06.333 --> 00:39:08.087
Sal: We go back and forth on that, but

00:39:08.087 --> 00:39:14.715
we're thinking about it.
We're thinking about it.

00:39:14.715 --> 00:39:15.666
Nina: Where would you
put it, which country

00:39:15.666 --> 00:39:17.095
would you pick?

00:39:17.095 --> 00:39:18.630
Sal: Well for selfish
reasons, I would probably

00:39:18.630 --> 00:39:21.296
put it in Mountainview,
California which is within

00:39:21.296 --> 00:39:24.606
walking distance, but
seriously I think it's

00:39:24.606 --> 00:39:28.433
interesting and this
shows the emphasis we put;

00:39:28.433 --> 00:39:29.570
I think a physical experience is

00:39:29.570 --> 00:39:31.132
incredibly, incredibly important.

00:39:31.132 --> 00:39:32.570
A lot of people in Silicon
Valley say well you're

00:39:32.570 --> 00:39:34.768
at scale already, you're
reaching 7 million and you're

00:39:34.768 --> 00:39:36.564
growing, you're doubling
every year, you could

00:39:36.564 --> 00:39:38.230
reach 100 million students
in five years, maybe a

00:39:38.230 --> 00:39:41.244
billion and why are you
even thinking about physical

00:39:41.244 --> 00:39:44.069
or why are you thinking
about physical schools.

00:39:44.069 --> 00:39:47.083
I would say well that's
because that's the core and I

00:39:47.083 --> 00:39:51.008
also think you need...You
might say well why focus

00:39:51.008 --> 00:39:52.547
on one school that
might be able to reach a

00:39:52.547 --> 00:39:54.373
few hundred kids when you're able to reach

00:39:54.373 --> 00:39:56.995
100 million maybe one day?

00:39:56.995 --> 00:39:59.738
The idea is if you can
show examples of this,

00:39:59.738 --> 00:40:01.931
and there are schools
that have already moved in

00:40:01.931 --> 00:40:03.600
that direction. Los Altos
has moved in that direction.

00:40:03.600 --> 00:40:05.205
Summit Prep, which is a charter school,

00:40:05.205 --> 00:40:06.494
they've broken down walls.

00:40:06.494 --> 00:40:08.093
They have multiple teachers
teaching classes in

00:40:08.093 --> 00:40:11.848
these epic environments.

00:40:11.848 --> 00:40:14.425
If you show examples of
this, then I think that's

00:40:14.425 --> 00:40:16.761
what moves the dial forward.

00:40:16.761 --> 00:40:19.024
Nina: How much would be the tuition?

00:40:19.024 --> 00:40:21.092
Sal: The tuition would be...

00:40:21.092 --> 00:40:22.486
Nina: He's looking at Avenues, the school

00:40:22.486 --> 00:40:24.505
in New York, $40,000 a child.

00:40:24.505 --> 00:40:26.369
Sal: That's the interesting thing.

00:40:26.369 --> 00:40:28.207
Nina: It was built without
this book and a vision

00:40:28.207 --> 00:40:30.593
behind it, right. A lot of marketing.

00:40:30.593 --> 00:40:33.368
Sal: The money is fascinating.

00:40:33.368 --> 00:40:36.646
Education is; someone
asked me recently could you

00:40:36.646 --> 00:40:38.794
ever spend too much on
education and to some degree

00:40:38.794 --> 00:40:39.879
the answer is no.

00:40:39.879 --> 00:40:41.693
It's such an important
thing, but at the same time

00:40:41.693 --> 00:40:43.171
if you're going to spend that much money,

00:40:43.171 --> 00:40:44.635
you have to think
seriously about how you're

00:40:44.635 --> 00:40:48.614
spending it and I've
met with some officials

00:40:48.614 --> 00:40:50.055
about this.

00:40:50.055 --> 00:40:54.025
A public level, charter,
private schools and

00:40:54.025 --> 00:40:56.071
regardless of school, I
say how much do you spend

00:40:56.071 --> 00:40:57.861
per pupil per year.

00:40:57.861 --> 00:41:00.593
If you ask a private school,
some of them $25,000,

00:41:00.593 --> 00:41:02.536
$30,000, $40,000 a year.

00:41:02.536 --> 00:41:07.670
You ask a public school,
some states as low it goes

00:41:07.670 --> 00:41:09.611
down to $5-6,000 a year but most states,

00:41:09.611 --> 00:41:11.664
especially on the east
coast, it's $10-15,000.

00:41:11.664 --> 00:41:13.660
New York City public schools $18,000,

00:41:13.660 --> 00:41:15.881
Cambridge, Massachusetts $25,000

00:41:15.881 --> 00:41:17.696
per year per student.

00:41:17.696 --> 00:41:20.253
I say okay, what's your
average class size and they'll

00:41:20.253 --> 00:41:21.672
usually say number between 20 and 30.

00:41:21.672 --> 00:41:24.530
I said okay private
school, you're charging

00:41:24.530 --> 00:41:26.259
$30,000 a year, there's 20 students.

00:41:26.259 --> 00:41:29.146
That's $600,000 per classroom.

00:41:29.146 --> 00:41:32.778
It's essentially for what's
directly impacting the

00:41:32.778 --> 00:41:34.389
students, the teachers, the classroom

00:41:34.389 --> 00:41:35.947
and maybe the textbooks.

00:41:35.947 --> 00:41:39.063
All I can figure out is
maybe there's $100,000,

00:41:39.063 --> 00:41:41.065
$150,000 being spent there.

00:41:41.065 --> 00:41:44.010
Where's the other quarter
of a million or $300,000?

00:41:44.010 --> 00:41:45.704
Same thing at any level.

00:41:45.704 --> 00:41:50.695
Why can't we instead use;
the private school I think

00:41:50.695 --> 00:41:54.960
for $10,000 a year, instead
of $40,000, $10,000 a year,

00:41:54.960 --> 00:41:56.504
let's say you have 30 students in a class.

00:41:56.504 --> 00:41:58.048
That's $300,000 a year.

00:41:58.048 --> 00:42:01.008
I say pay the teacher $150,000.

00:42:01.008 --> 00:42:02.941
A lot of people pay lip service to you.

00:42:02.941 --> 00:42:05.521
Oh, teaching should be
on par with doctors,

00:42:05.521 --> 00:42:07.030
engineers and lawyers.

00:42:07.030 --> 00:42:09.198
That's nice lip service but
if you really believe that,

00:42:09.198 --> 00:42:10.834
pay teachers the same as

00:42:10.834 --> 00:42:12.470
doctors, engineers and lawyers.

00:42:12.470 --> 00:42:14.107
That's the best signal to
society that you actually

00:42:14.107 --> 00:42:17.573
value it, but the money is clearly there.

00:42:17.573 --> 00:42:20.214
It'll have to get cut from
all the stuff that's not

00:42:20.214 --> 00:42:22.234
impacting the students.

00:42:22.234 --> 00:42:24.742
I don't know, every time
I ask this to people,

00:42:24.742 --> 00:42:26.736
I just do this back of
the envelope calculation.

00:42:26.736 --> 00:42:27.957
This is what I used to
do in my old career.

00:42:27.957 --> 00:42:30.040
I used to speak to CFOs,
say you're making this much;

00:42:30.040 --> 00:42:31.709
what am I missing?

00:42:31.709 --> 00:42:35.911
Same exact question;
$15,000 times 30 students is

00:42:35.911 --> 00:42:39.097
$450,000 a year.

00:42:39.097 --> 00:42:42.368
The fully loaded cost
of the teacher is less

00:42:42.368 --> 00:42:43.335
than half of that.

00:42:43.335 --> 00:42:45.362
Where's that money going?

00:42:45.362 --> 00:42:48.059
I think you could do a
very good model for what

00:42:48.059 --> 00:42:51.232
public schools are spending,
definitely some of the

00:42:51.232 --> 00:42:55.597
school systems that are
spending $10,000 plus.

00:42:55.597 --> 00:42:59.553
Nina: Talk a little bit
about how Bill Gates came

00:42:59.553 --> 00:43:02.805
to discover you and I
just thought that chapter

00:43:02.805 --> 00:43:04.513
was so interesting.

00:43:04.513 --> 00:43:06.822
Yes. What was it like to
find out all of a sudden

00:43:06.822 --> 00:43:10.287
that Bill Gates was watching your videos?

00:43:10.312 --> 00:43:11.958
What went through your mind?

00:43:11.958 --> 00:43:13.606
Sal: I used to wake up
in the morning sometimes,

00:43:13.606 --> 00:43:15.166
wondering if that was all made up

00:43:15.166 --> 00:43:19.059
or a dream or something.

00:43:19.059 --> 00:43:20.662
The site had already gotten
traction, but summer of

00:43:20.662 --> 00:43:25.567
2010, one of our first
donors, Ann Door, started

00:43:25.567 --> 00:43:26.940
sending me text messages
than Bill Gates was

00:43:26.940 --> 00:43:29.808
at the Aspen Ideas
Festival telling the whole

00:43:29.808 --> 00:43:33.180
audience that he uses a site
that he thinks is great,

00:43:33.180 --> 00:43:34.722
called the Khan Academy.

00:43:34.722 --> 00:43:36.640
He uses it with his kids
and he uses it himself,

00:43:36.640 --> 00:43:38.396
which made me a little
nervous because those videos

00:43:38.396 --> 00:43:42.944
were for Nadia, and I
didn't know what to do.

00:43:42.944 --> 00:43:44.827
Do I reach out to him?

00:43:44.827 --> 00:43:47.670
I don't think he's listed.

00:43:47.670 --> 00:43:50.349
Then two weeks later, his
chief-of-staff called and

00:43:50.349 --> 00:43:53.371
said you might have heard
Bill's a fan and I was like

00:43:53.371 --> 00:43:55.890
yeah, yeah I heard that.

00:43:55.890 --> 00:43:58.887
They said if you're free,
we'd like to fly you up.

00:43:58.887 --> 00:44:01.185
I was looking at my calendar,
it was completely blank.

00:44:01.185 --> 00:44:03.794
I think I could make some time for Bill.

00:44:03.794 --> 00:44:05.094
I've got to cut my nails,
but other than that

00:44:05.094 --> 00:44:08.333
my schedule is flexible.

00:44:08.333 --> 00:44:11.587
I went up and really
articulated, now at this time

00:44:11.587 --> 00:44:13.056
it was mainly the videos that I was doing,

00:44:13.056 --> 00:44:15.146
I was like look if we
could get some resources

00:44:15.146 --> 00:44:16.952
and I was dreaming about a
five person team and some

00:44:16.952 --> 00:44:19.766
office space, that was
the dream at that point.

00:44:19.766 --> 00:44:22.939
We could build out the
software that I started

00:44:22.939 --> 00:44:24.484
doing with my cousins.

00:44:24.484 --> 00:44:26.049
Students could get practice,
they could feedback,

00:44:26.049 --> 00:44:27.772
we could start building
a community on the site

00:44:27.772 --> 00:44:29.230
so that students can
start helping each other.

00:44:29.230 --> 00:44:31.066
We could build dashboards
for teachers so that

00:44:31.066 --> 00:44:33.401
they could use it to diagnose students and

00:44:33.401 --> 00:44:36.250
leverage class time more effectively.

00:44:36.250 --> 00:44:39.656
Him and then later Google
as well, they were strong

00:44:39.656 --> 00:44:41.282
believers in that.

00:44:41.282 --> 00:44:46.249
Nina: Great. You talk a
little bit about talent

00:44:46.249 --> 00:44:49.472
and creativity in your
book and we talked a little

00:44:49.472 --> 00:44:52.208
bit about this earlier
on, but do you think

00:44:52.208 --> 00:44:56.256
the advent of all these,
not the advent but a couple

00:44:56.256 --> 00:44:59.106
years ago, there were
books focused on talent,

00:44:59.106 --> 00:45:01.435
Talent is Overrated, The
Talent Code, you name it

00:45:01.435 --> 00:45:04.384
and I've read all of
them myself as I have a

00:45:04.384 --> 00:45:06.816
7-year-old who I'm trying
to foster into a talented

00:45:06.816 --> 00:45:09.136
individual, do you think
talent and creativity

00:45:09.136 --> 00:45:14.409
are things that can be in
fact taught to children?

00:45:14.409 --> 00:45:19.062
Sal: I don't think they're...I'm
not sure and in fact,

00:45:19.062 --> 00:45:22.418
I think no one is sure.

00:45:22.418 --> 00:45:26.883
My sense, through both
observation and even seeing

00:45:26.883 --> 00:45:28.870
what's happening there,

00:45:28.870 --> 00:45:30.503
is it's not something that's taught,

00:45:30.503 --> 00:45:32.844
but it's something that can be untaught.

00:45:32.844 --> 00:45:39.516
It can be fostered or
it can be suppressed,

00:45:39.516 --> 00:45:41.145
both talent and creativity.

00:45:41.145 --> 00:45:44.934
I think everyone is born with creatitivy.

00:45:44.934 --> 00:45:49.208
There's not a 2-year-old
on the planet who if you

00:45:49.208 --> 00:45:51.354
introduce a new object
into the room will not

00:45:51.354 --> 00:45:53.639
walk up to that object
and manipulate it in

00:45:53.639 --> 00:45:55.232
every way, taste it, feel
it, see what they can

00:45:55.232 --> 00:45:56.778
do with it, pour something.

00:45:56.778 --> 00:45:58.315
There's not a 2-year-old on the planet.

00:45:58.315 --> 00:46:00.563
There's not a 5-year-old,
actually most 5-year-olds

00:46:00.563 --> 00:46:02.431
will still, a new object
in the room, they will

00:46:02.431 --> 00:46:03.357
engage with it, a new idea,

00:46:03.357 --> 00:46:05.058
they'll ask questions about it.

00:46:05.058 --> 00:46:07.398
Then something happens
where they're taught

00:46:07.398 --> 00:46:09.042
to become more passive.

00:46:09.042 --> 00:46:10.841
To some degree, they're
in an environment where

00:46:10.841 --> 00:46:13.261
questioning is not always cool.

00:46:13.261 --> 00:46:16.561
They're so overwhelmed with work,

00:46:16.561 --> 00:46:19.228
whether it's soccer
practice or homework, that

00:46:19.228 --> 00:46:20.718
there's no time for them to kind of just

00:46:20.718 --> 00:46:22.179
think about something.

00:46:22.179 --> 00:46:24.005
The class is moving on, why
can't they think about it.

00:46:24.005 --> 00:46:26.088
Why am I carrying the one,
that doesn't make sense;

00:46:26.088 --> 00:46:27.594
this seems just like a formula to me.

00:46:27.594 --> 00:46:29.093
They don't have time
for that type of stuff.

00:46:29.093 --> 00:46:33.259
All of these things fall
from this idea of just

00:46:33.259 --> 00:46:35.234
breaking from this Prussian
model, breaking from

00:46:35.234 --> 00:46:36.868
this one pace fits lecture.

00:46:36.868 --> 00:46:39.039
As soon as you take that
out, now all of a sudden

00:46:39.039 --> 00:46:42.119
you can say hey, why
can't we let a student -

00:46:42.119 --> 00:46:44.410
If there's a 16-year-old
some place in the country

00:46:44.410 --> 00:46:47.666
who has just some insight
on like well maybe cancer

00:46:47.666 --> 00:46:50.794
can be addressed and maybe
this is what cancer is,

00:46:50.794 --> 00:46:55.120
too bad, the bell's going
to ring or they have

00:46:55.120 --> 00:46:57.217
an AP test the next day
or they have an exam.

00:46:57.217 --> 00:46:59.228
They're like oh well, I
have too much work to do.

00:46:59.228 --> 00:47:02.377
I quote an admissions officer in the book,

00:47:02.377 --> 00:47:05.015
talk about she was
interviewing a bunch of people

00:47:05.015 --> 00:47:07.064
who were coming to a very
elite college and said

00:47:07.064 --> 00:47:09.536
what do you daydream about
and the one student said,

00:47:09.536 --> 00:47:11.039
"We don't daydream about
anything because it doesn't

00:47:11.039 --> 00:47:13.862
help us to get into
college," and that's tragic.

00:47:13.862 --> 00:47:15.698
It's tragic for that
child, but it's tragic for

00:47:15.698 --> 00:47:18.391
society because it's those
daydreams that eventually

00:47:18.391 --> 00:47:21.596
lead to actual; I'll tell you.

00:47:21.596 --> 00:47:23.989
Khan Academy exists to a
large degree because my

00:47:23.989 --> 00:47:27.157
boss at the hedge fund,
very non traditional for

00:47:27.157 --> 00:47:29.953
that field, had a strong
belief in life work and

00:47:29.953 --> 00:47:34.282
balance and so I had
time to daydream about

00:47:34.282 --> 00:47:35.168
the Khan Academy.

00:47:35.168 --> 00:47:38.176
I had time and my wife
was a resident, a medical

00:47:38.176 --> 00:47:39.885
resident so I felt bad
sitting and vegging and

00:47:39.885 --> 00:47:44.226
watching TV and so I was
able to think about this

00:47:44.226 --> 00:47:47.451
problem and make resources.

00:47:47.451 --> 00:47:49.983
I think anyone is capable of doing that.

00:47:49.983 --> 00:47:51.530
We just have to give them the time and the

00:47:51.530 --> 00:47:53.113
breathing room to do that.

00:47:53.113 --> 00:47:55.283
Nina: Especially now since
it appears, I don't know

00:47:55.283 --> 00:47:59.784
if this was in your book, I
heard it from Tom Freedman.

00:47:59.784 --> 00:48:02.655
Most of the jobs of tomorrow
are going to be jobs

00:48:02.655 --> 00:48:05.323
that are created, not
jobs that currently exist.

00:48:05.323 --> 00:48:09.694
Sal: The Prussian model
started in the Industrial

00:48:09.694 --> 00:48:12.447
Revolution and in Industrial
Revolution, we needed

00:48:12.447 --> 00:48:14.634
probably more educated
people than we needed

00:48:14.634 --> 00:48:16.836
in an agrarian civilization.

00:48:16.836 --> 00:48:18.481
You needed people who
could read the directions

00:48:18.481 --> 00:48:21.088
and have the discipline of
the assembly line and all

00:48:21.088 --> 00:48:24.109
of that, but there was
also a certain passivity

00:48:24.109 --> 00:48:25.976
that you also had to implicate.

00:48:25.976 --> 00:48:27.777
In the farm, there's a
certain independence and

00:48:27.777 --> 00:48:28.862
freedom to it.

00:48:28.862 --> 00:48:30.097
All of a sudden in a
factory, you're doing this

00:48:30.097 --> 00:48:32.291
over and over again.

00:48:32.291 --> 00:48:35.861
One can debate whether
it was explicitly done,

00:48:35.861 --> 00:48:38.481
but there was an element
of instilling that

00:48:38.481 --> 00:48:42.266
passivity and indoctrination
so that people

00:48:42.266 --> 00:48:43.914
could be good workers.

00:48:43.914 --> 00:48:46.498
Before the pyramid was
like this; you needed

00:48:46.498 --> 00:48:48.111
a few knowledge workers
who were doing creative

00:48:48.111 --> 00:48:50.750
things and then you
needed a mass of labor.

00:48:50.750 --> 00:48:53.784
Now the pryamid is kind
of inverted where we need

00:48:53.784 --> 00:48:56.003
a lot of creative people,
in fact all the careers

00:48:56.003 --> 00:48:59.422
now are creative focus and open-ended,

00:48:59.422 --> 00:49:02.720
and you need very little physical labor.

00:49:02.720 --> 00:49:06.441
In that reality, we're
training people for this

00:49:06.441 --> 00:49:08.529
while we need the opposite.

00:49:08.529 --> 00:49:11.948
Nina: Since we are in the
nation's capitol, do you

00:49:11.948 --> 00:49:14.307
have any advice for
Congress or the President?

00:49:14.307 --> 00:49:18.241
How can they best help
bring this vision to life,

00:49:18.241 --> 00:49:19.702
understanding that?

00:49:19.702 --> 00:49:22.033
Sal: That's a very interesting
question because we

00:49:22.033 --> 00:49:25.337
do meet with state officials
and federal officials,

00:49:25.337 --> 00:49:27.449
even in other countries,
ministries of education

00:49:27.449 --> 00:49:29.743
and the one thing that I
don't want to happen is

00:49:29.743 --> 00:49:32.834
right now it's been a very
grassroots, ground up thing.

00:49:32.834 --> 00:49:34.353
People have word of mouthed Khan Academy.

00:49:34.353 --> 00:49:36.044
People have been using it,
parents have been telling

00:49:36.044 --> 00:49:38.415
parents, teachers have
been telling teachers and

00:49:38.415 --> 00:49:41.020
that's good because that's
from people who want

00:49:41.020 --> 00:49:42.340
to make it work and they
figure out and they tell

00:49:42.340 --> 00:49:44.175
us ways to make it work better.

00:49:44.175 --> 00:49:47.330
As soon as you make it top
down, I think it becomes

00:49:47.330 --> 00:49:51.772
no one likes it anymore
and so we want this to

00:49:51.772 --> 00:49:52.804
be very grassroots.

00:49:52.804 --> 00:49:54.310
Whatever I tell people is
just tell people about it.

00:49:54.310 --> 00:49:55.979
Tell people at minimum
they have a free tutor.

00:49:55.979 --> 00:49:57.853
Tell teachers that look,
there might be another

00:49:57.853 --> 00:50:00.211
model that you probably will enjoy more.

00:50:00.211 --> 00:50:02.990
There are ways to reach
more students and on top of

00:50:02.990 --> 00:50:05.909
that and I'm serious about this,

00:50:05.909 --> 00:50:08.696
I think they should set an example.

00:50:08.696 --> 00:50:12.309
It's too easy now in our
society for people to say

00:50:12.309 --> 00:50:14.060
oh, I'm not good at math
and they'll say about

00:50:14.060 --> 00:50:15.802
6th grade math.

00:50:15.802 --> 00:50:17.381
That's math; I don't understand it.

00:50:17.381 --> 00:50:19.891
No one will say oh, I can't
read at a 6th grade level

00:50:19.891 --> 00:50:22.000
or I can barely write.

00:50:22.000 --> 00:50:24.252
No one says that, but
you'll hear politicians

00:50:24.252 --> 00:50:26.200
say that, you'll hear
CEOs say that, you'll hear

00:50:26.200 --> 00:50:28.973
people in the press say
that and I think that

00:50:28.973 --> 00:50:30.726
messaging should change.

00:50:30.726 --> 00:50:32.308
Frankly, the only way
that could change is if

00:50:32.308 --> 00:50:33.936
they directly engage with it.

00:50:33.936 --> 00:50:35.808
It's shocking how many
people are engaged in

00:50:35.808 --> 00:50:38.769
education policy when they don't know the

00:50:38.769 --> 00:50:40.056
subject matter themselves.

00:50:40.056 --> 00:50:41.438
Oh, I'm not good at
math, but this is how we

00:50:41.438 --> 00:50:43.696
should test math teachers.

00:50:43.696 --> 00:50:44.803
That's crazy.

00:50:44.803 --> 00:50:46.369
You, yourself, should
engage in the content or

00:50:46.369 --> 00:50:48.863
get adept in the content
and that will be a huge

00:50:48.863 --> 00:50:50.450
signal to society and
I think it'll also help

00:50:50.450 --> 00:50:52.717
inform policy and I think
the more they do that,

00:50:52.717 --> 00:50:56.138
they'll realize it's a
lot less about top down,

00:50:56.138 --> 00:50:58.420
a lot less about the controls.

00:50:58.420 --> 00:51:00.338
The controls that they
do at every iteration of

00:51:00.338 --> 00:51:02.218
ed reform is just about
more controls on teachers

00:51:02.218 --> 00:51:07.643
and it might derisk some
of the weaker players,

00:51:07.643 --> 00:51:11.341
but it also handicaps all the rest.

00:51:11.341 --> 00:51:15.560
It gets to this culture of
everyone getting to mediocre

00:51:15.560 --> 00:51:17.773
and what we really need
to do is go the other way,

00:51:17.773 --> 00:51:19.391
have it be much more grassroots.

00:51:19.391 --> 00:51:22.181
What I point out in this book,
that's an American thing.

00:51:22.181 --> 00:51:24.917
We're a country that's
focused on creativity.

00:51:24.917 --> 00:51:26.321
We're a country that's
focused on people taking

00:51:26.321 --> 00:51:29.058
ownership over their lives,
but our school system

00:51:29.058 --> 00:51:31.401
is a Prussian one, one
that's about passivity,

00:51:31.401 --> 00:51:33.663
one that's about authority.

00:51:33.663 --> 00:51:35.552
Everything about this book is

00:51:35.552 --> 00:51:38.344
let's make our school
system more American.

00:51:38.344 --> 00:51:40.582
Nina: Any final thoughts?

00:51:40.582 --> 00:51:44.926
If you were sitting with
President Obama at the

00:51:44.926 --> 00:51:47.093
White House, aside from asking him to use

00:51:47.093 --> 00:51:50.720
his Bully Pulpit more,
what would you tell him?

00:51:50.720 --> 00:51:53.936
Sal: I'm somewhat about,
I would ask him to;

00:51:53.936 --> 00:51:55.468
this is a somewhat
different dimension, but we

00:51:55.468 --> 00:51:57.356
talk about this in the book.

00:51:57.356 --> 00:52:00.218
I would ask him to make
content for us because

00:52:00.218 --> 00:52:02.142
I think what's happening
right now is the public

00:52:02.142 --> 00:52:04.554
discourse gets so destroyed
in these 30 second

00:52:04.554 --> 00:52:07.329
sound bytes that you can't
have a chance to go deep

00:52:07.329 --> 00:52:09.310
on either side of the aisle.

00:52:09.310 --> 00:52:12.452
Right now, the main adult
learning happens on the

00:52:12.452 --> 00:52:15.654
24-hour news and it's in
these 30 second sound bytes.

00:52:15.654 --> 00:52:17.305
No one really understands
the issues and it just

00:52:17.305 --> 00:52:18.824
becomes very emotionally charged.

00:52:18.824 --> 00:52:21.661
This form factor or this
way, it's a chance for

00:52:21.661 --> 00:52:25.329
Obama to really explain why he makes the

00:52:25.329 --> 00:52:26.808
decisions he does and
maybe the opposition to

00:52:26.808 --> 00:52:30.226
really explain and get
to it and diagram it out

00:52:30.226 --> 00:52:31.852
and even have a quiz
afterwards to make sure

00:52:31.852 --> 00:52:33.036
people are retaining it.

00:52:33.036 --> 00:52:35.052
It would fill in that gap
in learning that frankly

00:52:35.052 --> 00:52:36.392
people are creating.

00:52:36.392 --> 00:52:38.093
Some of our most popular
videos are about credit

00:52:38.093 --> 00:52:40.226
default swaps or about
the healthcare plan or

00:52:40.226 --> 00:52:42.198
the electoral college.

00:52:42.198 --> 00:52:44.279
These are gaps in people's
learning and adults of

00:52:44.279 --> 00:52:45.642
any age want to learn that.

00:52:45.642 --> 00:52:48.207
Nina: Well, it was a
pleasure reading this book.

00:52:48.207 --> 00:52:49.941
It was nice meeting you.
Thanks for joining us.

00:52:49.941 --> 00:52:52.715
Sal: Oh no, it was a pleasure.