Guiding Principles – Part 3

The following is the third part of our assumptions pulled from our “Guiding
Principles” Wikipage.

Here is Part 1 and Part 2

Assumptions Part 3:

These are broad based and not as set as principles. It’s useful to list assumptions, just to be clear on the thought behind the system. Some of these are more controversial than others. Some were controversial when we started and are not anymore. Some we believe wholeheartedly. With others, we just needed to pick a side.

On Research

1. Research and “truth” are great. Trying things is an important first step towards both. We are on that first step.
2. Entrepreneurs can’t do research and market at the same time. We like research and researchers and hope to work with lots of them. Ethics will require transparency, that’s a good thing.

On Academia vs. Business

1. We would like to build a bridge over the “vs.” see research above.
2. On average, businesses should be more honest and transparent.
3. On average, academia should be more flexible and experimental.

On Changing the Education System

1. We’re not setting out to revolutionize anything. We are doing things that seem smart that are now possible. It’s incremental change that’s now obvious to us.
2. We might be wrong. That’s cool. Luckily, we’ll only be losing our own money.
3. This isn’t foreign policy, if we are wrong, our mistake won’t hurt anyone.
4. “If you aren’t prepared to be wrong, you’ll never do anything original.” -Sir Ken Robinson
5. Pedagogy is great, it’s just not our focus with Red Rover. There is pedagogy built in to the tool. This list is part of that process, but again, it’s not our focus.
6. Very few people do things for the “right” reasons. Most people do it because everyone else is.
7. Most people don’t know or care why Facebook or iPhones work or how they change industries. They use them because they work well and everyone else does. We have to figure out the why and how for Red Rover, and know that most people will never care.
8. Tools that people use but don’t understand can change the world. This can be dangerous. We hope we’re not dangerous.
9. We don’t know as much history with education reform as we should. We will catch up on our reading as soon as we are done building this thing. In the meantime, we really appreciate summaries and reading lists**.

** Link Broken as of June/2019