The following article, THE HABITS OF EDUPRENEURSHIP, is co-authored by Chuck and his close friend Dr. Arthur Costa. These two long time educators met in the early 1960's when Art was the educational representative for NASA and Chuck was the assistant superintendent of the Kings County Superintendent of Schools in Hanford California. Art had just joined NASA after serving as a Consultant in the Los Angeles Superintendent of School Office. His specialty was Science Education.

Chuck and Art became lasting friends and were amongst the first Californian's receiving individualized and personal introduction to the work of Dr. J. Richard Suchman. In fact, Chuck and Art were sent throughout California by the offices of the NATIONAL DEFENSE EDUCATION ACT (NDEA) to introduce Dr. Suchman's program INQUIRY TRAINING to schools and districts.

The friendship never ended. While Art moved on to Sacramento State University, Chuck ended working with his partner Dr. Donald Leisey in the development of several independent elementary schools and neither stopped creating a variety of educational programs focused on LEARNING.

Art has helped establish such programs including COGNATIVE COACHING and HABITS OF THE MIND. Chuck has worked to create INNOVATIVE ASSESSMENT and CRITICAL LINKS. While Art and Chuck kept in contact and met often over the years, this short article is the first time they worked formally together since the 1970s when they cooperated on projects for SCIENCE RESEARCH ASSOCIATES (SRA) and other publications and workshops.

This article is but a glimpse of what they are working on today. What it has meant to both Art and Chuck is the exciting realization that after many years, many experiences, many changes they have ended up with that very same "reason for being"---LEARNING.     Read the Article

We need two school systems
courtesy of USA Today, February 9, 2010

Education in America could use a big dose of innovation. How about one public school system for employees, and another for entrepreneurs?

In the summer of 1932, presidential candidate Franklin Delano Roosevelt promised, "I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a new deal for the American people."

Today, it is time not for a "New Deal," but a "New Mission."

America's schools need to take a page from the businesses that have been created by entrepreneurs over the past decades. Henry Ford, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Sergey Brin and Larry Page have all given us the road map, but the path toward entrepreneurship is often the road less traveled America's schools.

The U.S. unemployment rate is currently 9.7% in what many call a "jobless recovery." So what should we do? The problem and the solution can be found in America's educational system and its current mantra: "Go to school and get good grades, so you can get a good high-paying job." In simpler terms that means, "Go to school to become a good employee." But there are too many employees, which is why we have an unemployment problem. Today, kids just out of school aren't finding jobs. At the same time, many of their parents are going back to school for retraining. But they're not finding jobs, either. The idea of a high-paying job for life is truly an American dream — but no longer a reality. With low-priced labor and lower-priced, higher-performance technology, high-paying American jobs will be disappearing at greater speed as they move overseas.

Two-track system

America's education system needs an injection of innovation — which is just what entrepreneurs do. We need two different public school programs: one for employees and one for entrepreneurs.

The way to train entrepreneurs is almost exactly the opposite of the methods used to train employees. Another common thread about Ford, Gates and Jobs is that they all dropped out of school. This is not to say education is not important, but training entrepreneurs is different from training people to be employees. It is much like the difference between traditional education and the military academy model.

Many of the lessons I drew upon to write my book, Rich Dad, come from the U.S. military academy system.

In 1965, 1 left a sleepy sugar plantation of Hilo, Hawaii, and journeyed to Kings Point, N.Y., to attend the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. With four years at the academy and six years as a Marine Corps pilot, including two trips to Vietnam, I gained many of the real-life skills and character traits I count on today as an entrepreneur.

Success in the military is a great bell­wether signaling achievement in business. For example, the Israeli Defense Forces area breeding ground for education and entrepreneurs, where many serve in units specializing in military technology. At the beginning of 2009, the 63 Israeli companies listed on the Nasdaq, many led by former IDF members, outnumbered those of any other foreign country, according to the book Start-up Nation by Dan Senor and Saul Singer. There are simple lessons here for America's gridlocked education system.

If I were running America's schools system, I would create the U.S. Business Academy for Entrepreneurs, modeled after our federal military academies. Admissions would be via congressional appointment along with nominations from community business leaders. The entrance exams would be rigorous; the curriculum would be very different from traditional colleges.

On first day at any of the five federal military academies, each student is required to memorize the academy's mission. In the military, mission is more important than life. After leaving the Marine Corps and starting my own business, I found many executives with MBA degrees focused only on money. Money was their only mission. If they could cut expenses by firing employees, so be it. This was unconscionable at the academy and the Marine Corps. As military officers, our mission was to serve our country and bring our troops home alive. It was drummed into our souls that our mission was more important than our lives.

The mission of the U.S. Academy for Entrepreneurs would be to create sustainable, well-paying jobs for employees by aggressive growth of the business. Too many executives are trained to grow the business through mergers and acquisitions, using massive amounts of debt. Though this might make shareholders happy, in most cases it rips the soul out of the business, loading it with debt while putting the jobs of employees at risk.

Creating real jobs

If corporate executives cannot grow a business organically, they will often repurchase their shares to make it look as if the share price is going up — again to keep shareholders happy and the CEO employed. This is business manipulation, and not the true mission of a sustainable business. The lesson learned is, a loyal employee is not as important as money.

The U.S. Business Academy for Entrepreneurs would have only real entrepreneurs as teachers. I would ask that they work for only $1 a year (think of the great entrepreneurial CEOs who have turned around their businesses doing the same). You see, if they were real entrepreneurs, they would not need the money. They would teach for the same reason the students are there: the mission to create entrepreneurs who create sustainable jobs for the country.

Whether you agree with me or not, I hope it's clear that we need to create more entrepreneurs — since only entrepreneurs can create real jobs.

We need to pledge ourselves to this New Mission: job creation by those who are true job creators.

Robert Kiyosaki is an educational entrepreneur, founder of the financial education-based Rich Dad Co. and author of best-sellers Conspiracy of the Rich and Rich Dad Poor Dad.

Students Pitch Business Ideas to Experts at Canal Competition
courtesy of the Marin Independent Journal, December 20, 2009

"We've had a lot of kids who were considering dropping out of our academic program because of financial pressures at home. We wanted to create a program that would give them the opportunity to make money while continuing to grow academically."
    James Wiley, Youth Education Coordinator for the Canal Alliance Young Entrepreneurship Project

Carla Martinez adjusted the microphone, smiled at her audience, and began to describe the clothing store of her dreams. "The mission of 'Classy & Fine' is to sell teenage girls clothes of good quality at a price that's affordable," said Martinez, a participant in Saturday's "Canal Busi­ness Idol" competition at the Pickleweed Community Center in San Rafael. "We'd be constantly updating our line, with everything in the store changing every three weeks."

Martinez's store - a boutique drawing from the best of Forever 21, American Eagle and Urban Outfitters - doesn't exist, of course. But it could, if the business leaders assembled for Saturday's competition chose to put their expertise and financial incentives behind her idea.

"This is their chance to bring their plan before the business leaders who could help launch them," said Janice Vela, director of development for the Canal Alliance.

Each of the 60 competitors in "Canal Business Idol" — all middle- and high-school participants in the Canal Alliance after school program - drafted a plan for their dream business, creating a mission statement, identifying their target market and explaining what their business would require in terms of retail space and personnel. They also created Web sites, business cards and on­line commercials to market their companies.

On Saturday, the 20 finalists in the program provided PowerPoint presentations describing their businesses to the competition's judges, who included Tamalpais Bank Vice President Dick Fletcher, Heffernan Insurance consultant Dan Mahoney and Mandy Gamarra and Allison Shrier of Dominican University's Green MBA program. Twelve winners - six middle and six high school students - received additional consulting sessions, a session with Credit Suisse mentors to discuss the financial viability of their projects, and the opportunity to make their ideas a reality with a grant of up to $1,000.

The competition, part of a nine-month Canal Alliance Young Entrepreneurs Project, wasn't just an opportunity for the participants to develop writing, technology and public speaking skills, said youth education coordinator James Wiley. It was also a necessity.

"We've had a lot of kids who were considering dropping out of our academic program because of financial pressures at home," Wiley said. "We wanted to create a program that would give them the opportunity to make money while continuing to grow academically."

Many of Saturday's presentations - delivered in both English and Spanish by their would-be entrepreneurs - reflected the kinds of businesses students would like to see in their neighborhoods: soccer clinics, shoe stores and clothing shops with longer hours, lower prices and a better selection than anything available at the local mall. But many offered particular innovations: Irving "Panchito" Magdelan's store featured soccer clothing made from recycled materials, while customers at Martinez's boutique could listen to a podcast describing the latest styles.

"We asked the kids to include something 'green' in their business, to give them a sense of what may be happening in the future," said Omar Carrera, business development specialist for the Canal Alliance. "They came up with some big ideas."

While a complete list of winning finalists was not available Saturday, winners included Angel Aguilar, Yami Ayala, Debbie Hunil, Samuel Landaverde, Irving Magdelan, Oscar Nunez and Jared Ramirez.

Find Jobs of the Future on Entreprenuerial Path, by Shufina English
courtesy of the San Francisco Chronicle and SFGate.com, November 22, 2009

We can solve today's problem, but how should we think about the future? Recent articles in The Chronicle stress that this is the worst job market for college graduates in memory. How can we train our children for future jobs when we don't know what those jobs will be?

I believe it is time for a sea change in thinking about education. Young children often are naturally entrepreneurial in their play and actions. Somewhere along the way, as they proceed through their education, they stop thinking "I can create something" and become focused solely on satisfying the eligibility requirements for graduation and entrance to higher-level institutions.

We should challenge our educational institutions to develop an educated and entrepreneurial workforce. Public education should develop a statewide entrepreneurship initiative for our students that incorporates entrepreneurship training into our academic fabric. This would be based on creative, immersive entrepreneurial experience and would be appropriate for all students, from K-12 through the University of California system.

Professors could link their classes with innovative businesses so that students understand the exigencies of a successful business and can see themselves as contributing participants. Entrepreneurship or business-plan competitions at all education levels, mentor and alumni networks and improved facilities for prototyping, testing and other business start-up requirements will develop the skills required for successful self-employment and business ownership.

We should take to heart the words of William Butler Yeats, "Education in not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire." Entrepreneurship is the heart of our economy. Let us celebrate and nurture this spirit.