I recently saw a PBS documentary on the birth of Silicon Valley. At one time, it was place that had nothing except cheap land and lots of farms. Las Vegas is ki

I recently saw a PBS documentary on the birth of Silicon Valley. At one time, it was place that had nothing except cheap land and lots of farms. Las Vegas is kind of like this. The key is to attract smart people. The problem with Las Vegas (or Nevada) is that the amount of engineers per capita is very low (about half of that in California). Also, business does have an impact on higher education. If you look at Stanford or Cal, they have a strong program in computer engineering. UCLA, USC both are strong in medical sciences. UCSD strong in biopharma. It could be a chicken and egg thing - at some point businesses will demand skilled technical people from the universities and will adapt their programs accordingly. Meetups allow me to learn from my peers. I would call that an educational tool. I suppose it depends what kind of meetups you go to...I like the powerpoint kind.