Graduated with a Major in Startups ⇒
You can also stretch the envelope in different fashions, too. Take an uptime class, where everyone gets a VPS at the beginning of the semester and has to keep their box up. Grade based on uptime. Have the professor DDOS them. Simulate a power outage at 3am. Simulate a huge traffic influx. Offline specific components. The point is things start to feel less like a class and more like an actual project, with real consequences.
Zach Holman’s post sums my thoughts on the academia very well. I share the view on the need for a more proactive curriculum and real-world assignments.
Most of the skills and knowledge that I use daily are self-taught. Learned, practised and improved on-the-go. There is no denial of getting some of the basics right at the university, but it is a pity to see academia falling far behind the real world, the real needs.
