3 ms·

A dozen out of 17k and students and academic staff. Great story. This interaction between industry and academia has long been one of Stanford's greatest streng

A dozen out of 17k and students and academic staff. Great story. This interaction between industry and academia has long been one of Stanford's greatest strengths. There is no Silicon Valley without Stanford, and that didn't happen overnight or even lately. Sure, CS is once again an absurdly popular major as it has been in the past. But with Stanford you don't have to choose between Harvard & MIT, you get both ['04 CS, color me biased].

ryguytilidie 13y ago
"A dozen out of 17k and students and academic staff. Great story." How is this relevant at all? The fact that some students are in a situation where they are pressured to drop out for the economic gain of their professors is clearly a problem. Just because it is happening to a small number of students doesn't make it okay...?
- mwfunk 13y ago
  It doesn't make it OK, but it absolutely makes it an isolated incident rather than something you can use to draw conclusions about how the entire university is changing, which is what the article was about.
- hemancuso 13y ago
  "Pressured to drop out for the economic gain of the professors?" Give me a break. Taking a break from Stanford undergrad for a few years with a few awesome peers to run a startup happens a few times a year, if not more lately. Some non-trivial portion of the CS majors join to start a company. Timing often dictates market opportunity. This seems like an amazing one - faculty want to join, you're backed by the president Stanford university. An absolutely fantastic opportunity that the students owe to their luck of having gotten into Stanford.
- tedunangst 13y ago
  How do you know the students didn't choose to go to Stanford with the dream of founding a startup and dropping out? Hint: "I'm biding my time here until I meet the right co-founder" has been the attitude of at least a few students, going back years.

ryguytilidie 13y ago

"A dozen out of 17k and students and academic staff. Great story." How is this relevant at all? The fact that some students are in a situation where they are pressured to drop out for the economic gain of their professors is clearly a problem. Just because it is happening to a small number of students doesn't make it okay...?

mwfunk 13y ago
It doesn't make it OK, but it absolutely makes it an isolated incident rather than something you can use to draw conclusions about how the entire university is changing, which is what the article was about.
hemancuso 13y ago
"Pressured to drop out for the economic gain of the professors?" Give me a break. Taking a break from Stanford undergrad for a few years with a few awesome peers to run a startup happens a few times a year, if not more lately. Some non-trivial portion of the CS majors join to start a company. Timing often dictates market opportunity. This seems like an amazing one - faculty want to join, you're backed by the president Stanford university. An absolutely fantastic opportunity that the students owe to their luck of having gotten into Stanford.
tedunangst 13y ago
How do you know the students didn't choose to go to Stanford with the dream of founding a startup and dropping out? Hint: "I'm biding my time here until I meet the right co-founder" has been the attitude of at least a few students, going back years.