MIT Boston USA celebrates 150 years this year.Some of the most profound inventions in computer science , like the magnetic core memory (I still remember my Professor at BITS Pilani Prof AP Mathur's lectures on the evolution of computers) ,the RSA algorithim and Norbert Wiener's Cybernetics (I remember referring to Prof Norbert Wiener's book in our BITS Pilani Library way back in 1978) were MIT's creations.Ken Olson (Digital Equipment Corp) , Du Pont and Arthur D.Little were all MIT alumni who started some of the world's greatest companies.The entire Route 128 highway was the capital of IT long before Silicon Valley came into being - and it was MIT which made this possible.
One of the most exciting innovations done by MIT over the past decade is The MIT Open Courseware.I refer to this extensively in my own teaching and research here at NMIMS.
My first Alma Mater BITS Pilani had a deep and intense collaboration with MIT.In fact MIT helped set up the very unique and highly flexible education system which BITS Pilani is so famous for.
I have enclosed below links to some very interesting write ups on MIT's 150 years which I came across today.Happy reading and reflecting.
Thank you MIT for such profound innovations!Thank you BITS Pilani for your collaboration with MIT! And thank you NMIMS for giving me the academic freedom to innovate in my teaching and research using , amongst other things , MIT Sloan's Open Courseware.
Regards
Dr.Nilay Yajnik
Professor and Chairman - Information Systems Area
Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies , Mumbai
Follow me on Twitter@NilayYajnik
Read and comment on my blog nilayyajnik.blogspot.com
Bill Gates on "Why MIT Matters" http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/specials/mit150/Gates/
