DRAFT Comments & Criticism Welcome * Joost Bonsen * 18 June 2001 * jpbonsen@alum.mit.edu * 617.930.0415
Developmental Innovations
or, how we at MIT can dramatically help the three-quarters of humanity in developing
nations is a blossoming theme at the Institute. While not yet an MIT priority, it could and perhaps should become
a major strategic thrust. Furthermore,
MIT has special institutional competencies encouraging us to focus on: (1) Developmental Technologies &
Designs, (2) Developmental Entrepreneurship & Finance, and (3) Developmental
Education & Intellectual Infrastructure. We are well-positioned to accelerate progress via the MIT
organizational triad of Education, Research, and Community/Extracurriculars.
Educational Offerings Today
Already we have popular classes in Developmental Economics, Development By
Design, Development Planning, Globalization, and more. The OpenCourseWare initiative may well have
its greatest impact in developing regions, where faculty and students can tap
into top tier content at a fraction of the current cost.
Research Thrusts Today
Faculty in the Schools of Engineering, Architecture, and Science study water
and sanitation systems, medical diagnostics, distributed and solar power,
sustainable housing, and more.
Extracurricular Activity Today
There is tremendous latent interest in developing regions at MIT among the
student body. Fully one-third of
graduate students are internationals and over half of these are from developing
regions. Informal polling suggests that
this population of students is tremendously interested in initiatives and
projects which have tangible bearing on life back home, as evidenced by AITI,
ATF, ThinkCycle, SEEDS, and AID, among others.
These student groups are pursuing internet initiatives in Africa,
educational exchanges in Latin America, and similar projects in South Asia and
elsewhere.
The Emerging Strategic Opportunity
And yet many of these developmental efforts at MIT are unconnected and
fragmentary. The people involved lack
the benefits of institutional framework, economies of scale, organizational
mindshare, and project financing. It is
challenging to make a big dent in the Research agenda at MIT, but there is
tremendous potential in influencing the Curricular and Extracurricular
dimensions at MIT, especially with modest amounts of seed or incentive
funding.
Potential Curricular Elements
Several classes need course building funds to reshape the curriculum, craft new
cases and materials, and rethink the projects.
Furthermore, enhanced existing and entirely new classes are needed to
tile the space of possibilities. For
example:
·
Developmental Technologies
Techniques, cases, and projects for designing solutions to problems faced by
the majority of humanity: inexpensive
shelter, distributed power, personal transportation, communication
infrastructure, eyecare, medical treatment, educational services, banking and
financial services.
·
Developmental Entrepreneurship
Cases and business plan projects about diffusing suitable and needed
technologies in an economical fashion throughout a region. Looking at historical successes and
failures.
Possible Extracurricular Innovations
The student and alumni body at and around MIT have passionate interest in and
willingness to invest their time and money towards developmental
innovation. Our challenge is to tap
this latent interest and channel it in organizationally productive ways. One historical model to follow is the
tremendous impact the student run MIT $50K Entrepreneurship Competition has had
in catering to student interest in technology startups, and also in
accelerating MIT curricular development via the more formal class offerings and
entrepreneurship programs. We are
poised for a similar boom in the Developmental Innovations arena. Many exciting ideas are possible, including:
·
Student Grassroots Development Conference
A unifying campus-wide conference drawing students from multiple regions and
disciplines together all interested in developmental progress. Such a conference would serve as a common
purpose for otherwise focused and fragmented groups each pursuing ideas and
interests specific to their region or discipline. With a unified conference, students at MIT can achieve global
media visibility and influence.
·
Developmental Technology Projects Fund
There are currently student groups focused on Model Rocketry, Autonomous Subs,
Model Railroads, etc. With a
Developmental Technology Projects Fund, we could seed fund entirely new groups
or the focused work of a few UROPs or graduate students working on a special
developmental systems project.
·
Student Group Collaboration Incentive Fund
Traditionally student groups have concentrated on their narrow interests in the
interest of expediency and natural foci.
More than in most fields, however, development is a shared concern and
an arena where spreading good ideas (or avoiding bad ones) is of great import. With financial incentives, we can encourage
cooperation towards greater common good.
·
Developmental Entrepreneurship Challenge
an MIT $50K Entrepreneurship Competition for developing regions Since the MIT
$50K Entrepreneurship Competition has been so successful here in the US and has
been copied by Universities and in developed regions world-wide, lets use
similar methods to inspire entrepreneurial thinking in emerging regions.
The
Vision: Towards a First-World Wide With concerted effort at
grassroots and top-levels at MIT, we can play a key role in accelerating human progress
globally towards a first-world, spread world wide. A place where hunger is vanquished, disease contained,
environment is cleansed, industry is sustainable, diverse cultures respected,
education widespread, wealth abundant, and much more. With our unique MIT abilities applied towards Developmental
Technologies, Developmental Entrepreneurship, and Developmental Education, we
are poised to be pathfinders towards this desirable tomorrow.
References Some listed here; others
to be found on the sites linked by these.