A World We Dara To Imagine Part Three

Chris Haroun, the founding partner of Haroun Education Ventures and an early investor in YouTube, states the importance of "dreaming big with a passion to learn, earn, and return with no limits." 

Technology is a powerful tool to help address global issues. It can transform lives. Since technology is powerful, cheap, and global in its reach, it can be used to provide impoverished people from around the world with a quality education to help them benefit their societies by equipping them with the right technical skills to develop mission-driven technologies. 

The name of my organization is Edu Global Ventures. Edu Global Ventures is an investment firm that believes in the power of globalization and is passionate about education and technology. My organization believes that all problems in the world can be solved with a combination of education and technology. Apollo Education Group, a privately held for-profit education fund, estimates that the global education market is worth $4.4 trillion. We will not give up and are looking to create enormous value in the long-term for the communities and entrepreneurs we support. We would like to provide the opportunity for less-fortunate people to connect with opportunities to do good through education by helping the entrepreneurs we invest in to identify problems in their local communities and develop solutions to overcome those issues.

At Edu Global Ventures, we pride ourselves in playing the long game, where we prioritize meaningful relationships over those with the odds of a quick financial return. We partner with passionate educators and entrepreneurs and provide them with a steady investment partner across their entire lifecycle. 

Edu Global Ventures has a simple "do-good" business model. We embrace the concept of patient capital where Edu Global Ventures funds companies that are using education to advance technology  and solve problems that exist in their local communities in exchange for equity in their company. It is important to note we are not looking for quick financial returns. Also, we recycle a portion of our financial returns and invest in fragile education systems in countries experiencing epidemics, disasters, and conflict to inspire the future generation of leaders that we hope to work with.

My organization is unique because it reaches out to countries experiencing epidemics, disasters, and conflict to help reconstruct fragile education systems with technologies developed by the creative entrepreneurs we invest in. People residing in countries experiencing epidemics, disasters, and conflict are hard to reach and according to Hector Ruiz, the executive chairman of Advanced Micro Devices, "Technology is only as powerful as it is accessible." We empower underprivileged entrepreneurs because we believe that anyone who has a will, adequate financial backing, and quality education can solve problems using technology.

For example, Sundar Pichai, Google's CEO, exemplifies the type of entrepreneurs Edu Global Ventures is seeking. Mr. Pichai grew up in Chennai, India to a lower-income family where he and his family would all sleep in a small apartment that did not have an adequate supply of electricity. By finding strategic mentors who gave him the opportunity to pursue an education at the Indian Institute of Technology, he eventually went on to become an innovative entrepreneur who is now the Chief Executive Officer of one of the largest companies in the world – Google. 

As a result, I believe Anima Mundi Development Partners should invest in Edu Global Ventures because it is a socially responsible and profitable company that accounts for people, profit, and the planet. Edu Global Ventures is tackling a massive problem – education. At Edu Global Ventures we believe that education and technology will make the world a better place, which is why we invest in passionate entrepreneurs to advance education through technology enabling less privileged people to grow and do good for the societies they live in.

A World We Dare To Imagine Part One

Brief summary of The Blue Sweater
The Blue Sweater by Jacqueline Novogratz focuses on complex global issues such as wealth disparity, gender inequality, corruption, and poverty through a personal lens. Also, I admire Jacqueline's ability to abide and promote her value of accountability, which she claims can transform human lives and have a measurable impact. An example of where the author ensured accountability was when she held impoverished women in Rwanda liable for a loan. This example of accountability illustrates how if a fortunate person is willing and able to help a less-fortunate individual then both parties should be held accountable for their actions or else the agreement would be meaningless. Also, I found it interesting to learn about the concept of "patient capital." Patient capital is a model of investment that produces both social and financial returns with the intent of alleviating issues regarding poverty.

Education can make the world a better place
Education is a human right. Every single boy and girl who wants a world-class education should have access to one since it can empower others to create lasting change. Consequently, my thesis is that education combined with technology can solve all the problems making this world a better place. Quality education is a path to economic success and social mobility, which lead to new opportunities in areas such as philanthropy, technology, and science. According to Nelson Mandela, "Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world."

"More than 120 million children do not complete primary education" as stated by Børge Brende, President, Member of the Managing Board, World Economic Forum Geneva. This statistic illustrates how millions of children globally do not have the opportunity to help support their families, develop their communities, escape poverty or a fair chance to get a decent job because they have no access to education. Also, the challenge is that a significant proportion of the youth and children around the world who are not pursuing education are the hardest to reach, as they reside in countries that are experiencing epidemics, disasters, and conflict. According to Jacqueline Novogratz, "Today, poor people the world over are seeking opportunity and choice to have greater dignity in their lives - and they want to do it themselves, even if they need a little help. Today we have the tools and technologies to bring real opportunities to people all across the world" (Novogratz, Page xii). So, think about how free, top-quality education can change the world and empower the poor by using technology to provide wireless internet in remote areas of the world, which is a problem that Facebook is already trying to solve through an initiative known as OpenCellular. Given that technology is powerful, relatively cheap, and global in its reach it can be used as a tool to provide less-fortunate boys and girls around the world with a quality education especially since the average price of a college education exceeds $100,000 according to the Insitute of Education Science and Pew Research Center (Carr, 2018).

Knowledge is power. To get an education teaches people how to problem-solve, think critically, and be creative, which can help advance research and development in the field of technology. Thus, allowing less-fortunate individuals who did not have access to education at one point to solve problem they found in their local community like wealth inequality and food shortages. According to the Global Partnership for Education, "420 million people would be lifted out of poverty with a secondary education, thus reducing the number of poor worldwide by more than half" (Collier et al, page 16). Also, "if the enrollment rate for secondary schooling is 10 percentage points higher than the average, the risk of war is reduced by about 3 percentage points" ("Reducing Global Poverty through Universal Primary and Secondary Education"). As a result, children who have access to quality education will have more opportunities and the right skills to succeed in the workplace having the ability to provide a more prosperous future for their families and communities, given that education is a fundamental human right and value.

Works Cited
Brende, Børge, and World Economic Forum Geneva. "Why Education is the Key to Development." World Economic Forum, Project Syndicate, 7 July 2015, www.weforum.org/agenda/2015/07/why-education-is-the-key-to-development/.

Carr, Nicholas. "The Crisis in Higher Education." MIT Technology Reveiw, MIT Technology Reveiw, 20 Apr. 2018, www.technologyreview.com/s/429376/the-crisis-in-higher-education/

Collier, et al. "Understanding Civil War: Evidence and Analysis, Volume 1. Africa." Open Knowledge Repository, Washington, DC: World Bank, 1 Jan. 1970, openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986,7437.

Novogratz, Jacqueline. The Blue Sweater: Bridging the Gap between Rich and Poor in an Interconnected World. Rodale, 2010.

"Reducing Global Poverty through Universal Primary and Secondary Education." UNESCO, June 2017. http://uis.unesco.org/sites/default/files/documents/reducing-global-poverty-through-universal-primary-secondary-education.pdf

Regalado, Antonio. "The Most Important Education Technology in 200 Years." MIT Technology Review, MIT Technology Review, 11 Dec. 2013, www.technologyreview.com/s/506351/the-most-important-education-technology-in-200-years/.

Random Post #2

Facebook Data Breach
Facebook has one crucial responsibility – to protect user data. If Facebook fails to protect user data, then the social media giant does not deserve to serve its end users given that the privacy of their personal information is a selling point for technology users.

In 2013, Aleksandr Kogan, a Cognitive and Behavioural Neuroscience researcher at Cambridge University, developed a personality test app as part of his academic research. Kogan's application was installed by 300,000 people globally who shared their personal information and unknowingly their friends' data with Facebook. Unfortunately, Facebook's platform at the time enabled app developers like Kogan to access millions of other peoples' data (Wagner, 2018).

In 2015, Cambridge Analytica, a big-data analytics research firm focused on political consulting, approached Aleksander Kogan to acquire the personal information of 50 million Facebook users illegally. Kogan's company, Global Science Research (GSR), agreed to share the personal information of Facebook users it had obtained with Cambridge Analytica to create personalized political ads and ultimately influence swing voters in the United States. Consequently, when the social media giant figured out that Aleksander Kogan sold Facebook user data to a third party, both Kogan and his app were removed from the platform for violating company policy. Also, Facebook requested certifications to verify that Kogan and Cambridge Analytica destroyed the user data.

Unfortunately, in 2018 an investigation conducted by the New York Times found that massive amounts of user data are still available to publicly to Facebook's developer community. The New York Times investigation hurt Facebook's public reputation because it demonstrated to members of the Facebook community that the social media conglomerate lacks integrity. For Facebook to maintain its diminishing trust with users, the company suspended Cambridge Analytica from its platform and rewrote its terms of service and data policies to restrict developers' data access. It is important to note that Facebook will continue to collect the same amount of information about users but won't share that data with developers and advertising businesses as much (“Cambridge Analytica Harvested Data of 50 Million Facebook Users") (Wagner, 2018).

As a result of Facebook's data breach, prominent figures like Elon Musk, the legendary founder of Tesla, SolarCity, and SpaceX, deleted his companies Facebook profiles. According to Musk, "I just don't like Facebook. Gives me the willies" (Grant, 2018). When Musk deleted the Facebook profiles of all his companies, he implicitly showed that he does not trust the social networking company with his data. He clarified that the deletion of his companies' Facebook profiles was not a strategic political statement.

Ironically, Facebook sells targeted advertisements to businesses based on user data, which accounts for the social media conglomerates' largest business segment. Given that Facebook wants to maintain its robust advertising-based business model, the company faces a significant challenge moving forward to ensure the trust and privacy of its users (Grant, 2018).

Facebook is actively trying to repair its public reputation and level of integrity with more than two billion users after the Cambridge Analytica scandal. According to Will Rogers, "it takes a lifetime to build a good reputation, but you can lose it in a minute."

Works Cited
“Cambridge Analytica Harvested Data of 50 Million Facebook Users.” News Al Jazeera, Al Jazeera, 17 Mar. 2018, www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/03/analytica-harvested-data-50-million-facebook-users-180317202148643.html.

Grant, Nico. “Facebook Data Scandal Has Left Zuckerberg Isolated in Tech.” Bloomberg.com, Bloomberg, 2 Apr. 2018, www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-02/facebook-data-scandal-has-left-zuckerberg-isolated-in-big-tech.

Wagner, Kurt. “Read Mark Zuckerberg's Full Statement on Facebook's Privacy Scandal.” Recode, Recode, 21 Mar. 2018, www.recode.net/2018/3/21/17147746/facebook-mark-zuckerberg-cambridge-analytica-data-breach-users-video-election.