Polymath University: A Demand-Driven Business Model for Higher Education in the U.S.
This webinar is a part of an Innovative Universities Webinar Series.
Polymath University is a non-profit university-in-the-making in Chicago, the US. On the academic side, bachelor's degree students will develop as 'modern polymaths' – leaders and problem solvers with breadth, depth, and integration of knowledge – by pursuing three non-adjacent majors. On the business model side, every student will serve as an apprentice with employer partners, where they will owe a multi-year work obligation after graduation in exchange for subsidized tuition.
En route to launching the bachelor's program in 2028, Polymath currently offers a master's level certificate and will launch an accredited master's degree in 2026.
- How to get employers interested in funding students' education over multiple years?
- Is there a way to make graduates ready for the labor market while still preserving the human side of education?
- Given that Polymath is the second project we cover, besides NewU, that innovates to address the issue of affordability, is it fair to speak of a wave of experimental institutions working toward this goal?
We will discuss this and more with Dan Futrell, the founder, who will share his team's work to build a new model for higher education that is interdisciplinary, apprenticeship-based, and debt-free.
Dan Futrell, the founder of Polymath University
- Dan Futrell is the founder of Polymath University (polymath.org) – a new nonprofit university that is interdisciplinary, apprenticeship based, and debt-free.
- Dan previously served as CEO of the Pat Tillman Foundation, is a former local elected official, and served as an airborne ranger-qualified infantry officer at home and abroad over five years.
- A former foster youth, he now holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Gonzaga and Harvard Universities, respectively. He is currently a veteran fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution.
