Master in AI | Kishan Sagathiya

Few days ago I purchased the domain name masterinai.com and launched a site that would give people certificate saying that You have finished the coursework equivalent to that of a masters program and you possess similar knowledge.

Currently, education is free. If you want to learn anything, you can go online, find free books, tutorials series, video lectures. There are even sites that let’s you do free exercises. The education methods available online are highly superior compared to that of your college professor and classroom learning. This is truly great time for those who want to learn. You are not limited by resources, but only by your willingness to learn.

So, it is not really possible to charge someone a lot for education material. Despite this, colleges are still thriving. Despite their exuberant fees, there is tremendous competition for getting college programs. That clearly tells that colleges are providing something that is truly valuable.

Colleges provide you with recognition and community. A job, a bootcamp or a series of online courses might not remain relevant or significant enough to put on your resume after some years. Unlike those, a college degree stays on your resume for the rest of your life.

Is it possible to provide valuable recognition at a cheaper cost and without having to go through thousand things that are wrong with colleges?

I will try to come up with a framework to be recognised, given that you possess the knowledge.

In other words, say a 40 years old English Teacher wants to get a job at Google as an AI Researcher. He cannot afford to leave his job, not earn for two years, and pay $80,000 tuition fees. Luckily, there is an online degree option for a much cheaper price, $30,000. But to even apply for the program, he has to write GRE (so irrelevant), prepare a letter of motivation to do that program, find two recommendation letters. Even, if he does that he might just get rejected, because he doesn’t really have the relevant background. Say, he is hardworking, self motivated and willing to finish the complete masters level coursework to prepare him to do research in AI. How can he prove that he is as good as someone with a masters degree and deserves that job? This the recognition problem.

As per the framework I am proposing, if he finishes following tasks, he should be deemed equivalent to having a masters degree:

Say, every chapter in the coursework contains quizzes. He has to clear every quiz.
Where applicable a chapter would be accompanied with assignments. He has to clear all assignments.
A showcasable usable project in the field.
Significant contributions to a known and already in use project in the field. The important thing here is to be able to show your individual contributions clearly. For example you could show your GitHub Pull Requests, if the project is on GitHub. A group project where you are not able to pin point your contributions is as good as nothing. It is much better to have have all of your contribution linked to each other. For example, fixing bugs or doing small issues for an open source project does not really tell much about your abilities. Building a whole new component from start does. If all these conditions are met such contributions can be considered as an alternative to the project component.
Publish a research paper.

In order to show that you have done, 3 to 5, you can do it on you own. To show that you have cleared tests and assignments, you would need some site where you submit those things and get a proof that you cleared them.

Why do I have to do 1 and 2? Can’t I just create a cool project, contribute to an open source project and publish a paper? There are examples of many people getting jobs that way. –> Yes, that is something that you can do. But it is not same as a degree. Doing project or publishing a paper gets you really deep into a topic. A degree gives you breadth as well. It gives you a decent idea about all aspects of the main subject you are trying to master. You can build a personalized news app that utilizes Reinforcement Learning, but that doesn’t mean you understand all other subjects of AI. There is value in getting that breadth. Having breadth benefits you in the long term.

A site that provides those MCQ tests, Assignments, interactive communities through online and sometimes offline events, provides certificates for finishing the program, categorizes students based on their abilities and performance and helps them with getting jobs through industry relations can replace colleges.