Carl Wieman – Creator, Senior Advisor
PhET Interactive Simulations
PhET Interactive Simulations is a non-profit open educational resource project that creates and hosts guided simulations. The venture mainly provides free STEM simulations and worksheets to go along with them for learners and educators. Over time, it has also become a platform for educators to share teaching resources. PhET Interactive Simulations allows abstract STEM concepts and theories to be visualized and experimented with in an engaging way, while also generating curiosity with its fun visuals and games.
Carl Wieman is an accomplished physicist and educationalist who has received the Nobel Prize in physics and numerous other awards and recognition for his contributions to physics, teaching, and education. His passion and extensive formal eduation has motivated him and provided him with expertise to create his venture. The current director has a similar academic background as Carl Wienman with a science PhD and also has experience in educational research. The associate director focuses on corporate relations, licensing, fundraising, and communications with experience in scientific insturment industry. There is a good balance in hard and soft skills in the leadership team.
https://phet.colorado.edu/en/about/team
Finding out about the entrepreneurs behind a platform that I frequently use as a science teacher is insipiring to me as it fits my goals of potentially starting a venture as an intrapreneur at my own school and then expanding from there. The team is mostly composed of experienced scientists and educators which shows that a venture can succeed based solely on its value added and does not always need flashy marketing.
I believe that Carl Wienman represents a strong role model for would-be entrepreneurs due to the fact that he took his professional expertise and applied them to find a more progressive way to teach and learn STEM concepts. I think that Wienman’s short bio points to the notion that learning scientific concepts should not be provided solely in books and lectures, as many of these concepts need to be experienced and experimented with in order to be truly understood. I think that Wienman is also a role-model due to the fact that he sought to share his knowledge and understanding rather than become a gate-keeper of the information.