Graduate Studies Program

10 Week Summer Session - The Graduate Studies Program (GSP) challenges future leaders and entrepreneurs to tackle widespread global problems with innovative team-based technology solutions.

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what Is the gsp?

the 10-week graduate studIes program (gsp) Is desIgned for leaders who want to buIld InnovatIve solutIons to global grand challenges.

Singularity University asks participants to develop accelerating technologies that can positively impact the lives of a billion people within 10 years. The GSP creates an unparalleled opportunity for participants to work together in international and interdisciplinary teams to address large-scale humanitarian challenges. Participants in this unique educational environment learn from each other, and from renowned experts in multiple disparate fields, in order to understand and apply these transformative, exponential technologies.

The Graduate Studies Program is held for 10 weeks in June- August each year.

You can help us make the Graduate Studies Program accessible to talented students with demonstrated financial need - click here to watch our fundraising video and meet the Class of 2013.

Learning by Doing

Participants contribute their domain expertise, leadership skills and passion for working on the world’s most pressing problems.

su amplIfIes these wIth nearly 400 hours of academIc actIvItIes: classes, hands-on workshops, sIte vIsIts, and collaboratIve teamwork actIvItIes.
In addItIon to these scheduled events, students lead theIr own self-organIzed sessIons, trIps, and workshops.

A program with this level of intensity requires integrated academic activities that provide detailed understanding of a topic, as well as tools for upcoming work. For example, a GSP13 Robotics workshop covers core curriculum using brainstorming and prototyping activities that directly apply to the Team Projects; a GSP13 lecture on a researcher’s global health impact are followed by technology lectures that expand on the background tools and technologies that make that researcher’s work possible. The program also requires a balanced, holistic approach to health and well-being. Our program integrates fun events, networking time, local trips, and a wellness program with options for healthy eating, exercise, stress-reducing meditation, sports and games.

Who Attends: our partIcIpants are...

entrepreneurs

polIcy Influencers

academIcs

bIg thInkers & Impact catalyst

ngo leaders & socIal entrepreneurs

technologIsts

Karoli
Hindriks

Business Week 2007 Europe’s Young Entrepreneur Award Nominee

Maayke Aimée
Damen

Former official Dutch youth delegate on Sustainable Development, United Nations

Andrew
Bishara

4th year Medical Student at Harvard Medical School

Matias
Rivera

General Manager, Reforest Patagonia – the largest reforestation campaign in Chile’s history

Melissa
McCoy

Partner, TOHL; Founder, Enterprise to Empower

Manu
Sharma

Aerospace Engineer

Academic Activities

classes, workshops, sIte vIsIts, peer-to- peer learnIng: all of these together gIve partIcIpants a broad, cross-dIscIplInary understandIng of the bIggest Ideas and Issues In transformatIve technologIes, as well as theIr IntersectIons wIth each other and wIth global grand challenges.

Our faculty invite leading researchers, entrepreneurs, scholars, and others from around the San Francisco Bay Area and the world to speak in engaging and thought provoking sessions. Courses cover multiple focus areas our tracks and grand challenges to identify and explore the causes and impact of exponential change, to show the opportunities and needs to address grand challenges, to understand the wider social implications of these changes, and to actively apply all of these in Team Project work.

In these pages you’ll see descriptions of our tracks and grand challenges, workshops, site visits and the team projects to get a taste of what past students have encountered, as well as what lies ahead for GSP13.

Workshops & Site Visits

Smaller-group workshops and site visits let participants learn more about the interdisciplinary and convergence aspects of these exponential technologies.

su takes advantage of Its locatIon In sIlIcon valley, the hub of the world’s high-technology revolutIon, to vIsIt companIes that are changIng the world.

SU also provides the opportunity for participants to work with skilled faculty in hands-on workshops on these world-changing technologies and their impact and implications.

Impact

the sIngle largest component of participants’ tiMe is spent on the teaM projects, where students actIvely respond to the 10^9+ challenge: how to posItIvely Impact a bIllIon people wIthIn a decade.

Participants form teams tasked with designing preliminary solutions addressing a challenge, and then work in teams to prototype, research, and develop solutions which can make a difference to the lives of a billion people. This is no simplefeat, and not every solution will succeed, but many SU teams have taken their work out into the real world, creating lasting projects, companies, and organizations working towards their goal. The SU atmosphere of innovation and exploration created by a diverse and talented GSP class is key to team project success.

The Global Grand Challenge (GGC) areas taught in the program represent problems affecting tens of millions to a billion (or more) people, where SU believes that small teams of people can make an enormous difference within the next decade. The GGC categories are just a starting point–some problems may be easily identified as being a single GGC, while most will sit at the intersections of several challenges.