There are many reasons why we do what we do, and why we believe the learning exchange concept can help to change the world. Below are three examples.
One of the great things about the learning exchange concept is that when you practice it, not only are you learning for free, but you're also getting better at teaching. You can't help it - either you get better at teaching and helping others, or no one wants to trade with you.
On LRNGO, your ability is not based on a stamp that says your certified, but rather a history of real feedback & results, thus creating a new economic path to teaching your expertise that didn't exist before.
Now people with no resources can gain real teaching experience through learning exchange at no cost, and build up enough positive feedback to begin earning money as private instructors. Then when there's enough demand, they can teach group classes in classrooms or online, or continue any combination of these options.
The idea of LRNGO is to provide an economic opportunity for growth that's accessible to everyone.
We believe that by enabling and empowering each other through learning, we can help individuals become more social and profitable, and that people around the world can make a difference helping each other learn.
In other words, we are all each other's greatest resource, and the world can never have too many teachers."
- David Brake, Speaking to the Houston Ed Tech Group, 1/7/2014
There are many people who have done great things, but then slipped into depression.
Sports heroes who have played in the World Series and the Super Bowl and then could no longer play have committed suicide because they thought their lives had no purpose.
Musicians and artists with great careers have given up on life when those careers went away.
Yet what they probably didn't know is that there are aspiring students throughout the world that would give ANYTHING to learn from them, and that this could be a fullfilling career.
Part of the problem is there was never a place where experts could go to find the right match of students who appreciate them, and where students could find the right mentors to make a difference in their lives by helping them accelerate their talent and achieve their goals.
If you're looking for on-demand learning, software or videos, the internet's already got you covered, but we really wanted to create a place for people to build real teaching & learning relationships offline and connect at no cost.
We're working hard to get the word out to everyone that there is now a free resource where students can find great mentors worldwide.
We want Lrngo.com to be that place."
- David Brake & Jeremy Clouse, Interview 12/18/2013
Good morning. I'm supposed to come up here today and talk about what we do, but I'm not going to do that. Instead, I'm going to talk about why we're doing it and why it's important.
The world is changing. We see seniors with no retirement, mid career layoffs everywhere, and college students and graduates with no jobs.
Technology and globalization are accelerating faster than anyone can keep up, the population has doubled, and we've connected almost everyone in every city.
We're disrupting almost every sector, making things better & faster, innovating, closing gaps and moving at the speed of light--and it's great, I mean it is... but the problem is, the speed at which we can learn from each other and accumulate knowledge and the infrastructures that we have to do it are still back here trying to keep up.
So you have people and companies struggling to adapt, and these people who get laid off and seniors with no retirement and college students with no jobs, they have skills and they know stuff...maybe stuff that people might want to learn, but they're doing nothing with that knowledge.
Some people blame the economy, but any economist will tell you economies are cyclical. Whether we're doing well or not, these problems will still be here, because it's a knowledge problem. I don't mean just schools, I mean the transfer of knowledge.
How do we keep up?
I need to know this, I need to learn that, and I need it all yesterday. I need a 4 year degree in 1 year. I need to change careers - again.
You see, what happened is the acceleration of technology moved so fast, that we didn't even notice that we're moving from a goods & services economy to a knowledge economy, and we have no structure for a knowledge economy - no currency, no marketplace, to enable transactions the way that money did for goods and services.
My name is David Brake, I'm the founder of LRNGO.com, and we're here to help solve this problem."
- David Brake, Speaking at Rice University, IT & Web Venture Forum, 12/6/2012
