(2007-03-13) Brown Engineering School Changes

John Seely Brown recommends changes to Engineering School-s. "I don't believe in the Digital Divide; we may have overplayed that. Most kids I know, if they want a Play Station 3 they're going to bust their butts to get the money for it," said Brown. "I've seen people who have dropped out of school and been called illiterate who get involved with remixing music, get appreciation from other people and get totally turned on. Getting acknowledged for creating something unleashes incredible Passion in these kids."... Likewise, some MIT students seldom attend classes, instead monitoring lectures from their dorm rooms with the school's online Open Course Ware network, then visiting campus mainly for the study groups. Similar models exist at Rice and Carnegie Mellon universities, and a social learning program at North Carolina State University has helped to greatly reduce drop-out rates of Women and minorities from engineering classes.