Part 6 of my Top 10 Ed-Tech Trends series
Khan Academy wasn't new in 2011, but oh man, was it news.
Sal Khan has been creating his own videos to teach math and science for seven years now, but the mainstream media discovered Khan Academy in a big way this year. You'd be hard-pressed to find a major news organization that hasn't covered the non-profit: Wired. CBS News. Fast Company. Techcrunch. Mother Jones. The New York Times. The Washington Post. The Charlie Rose Show. Inside Higher Ed. The Economist. KQED. Time. Al Jazeera. Slate. Business Week. The Colbert Report. Me. And so on.
Khan has received high praise, with the media labeling him the "Math Messiah." An "educational Moses." The new Andrew Carnegie." The guy who's going to "blow up education."
No doubt, Khan Academy is a great story: Sal Khan is an affable guy with 3 MIT degrees and an MBA from Harvard who initially just made videos to help tutor his cousins. A hedge fund manager, Khan quit that job in 2009 to found the non-profit Khan Academy, to focus on making the videos and to advocate for his larger vision.