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 Wednesday, July 21, 2010

The Khan Academy is a not-for-profit organization with the mission of providing a high quality education to anyone, anywhere. The academy has 1400+ videos on YouTube covering everything from basic arithmetic and algebra to differential equations, physics, chemistry, biology and finance which have been recorded by Salman Khan, a Harvard Business School Alum.

Khan got the idea for the Khan Academy when he agreed to help his cousin with sixth grade math. He posted tutorials for her over YouTube, as they didn’t live in the same city, and he noticed that not only were his videos getting tons of views but that viewers were sending him testimonials telling him how much his videos were helping them with math. Khan began to broaden the subject matter and concepts in his videos and the Khan Academy YouTube channel was born.

Millions of students around the world lack access to high quality instruction, especially in the sciences and math. The Khan Academy provides it for free in a way that can be accessed on-demand at a student's own pace. Khan says, “With just a computer and a pen-tablet-mouse, one can educate the world!”

The videos are directly teaching tens of thousands of students on every continent on a daily basis. Other non-profit groups have even begun distributing off-line versions of the library to rural and under served areas in Asia, Latin America, and Africa. The Khan Academy and Salman Khan have received a 2009 Tech Award in Education.

(Sources:Social Times, The Tech Awards)

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