Why Should Students Learn About Cryptocurrency
Are students going to benefit from a course in cryptocurrency? They sure can if you look at the overwhelming number of youngsters that are taking an active interest in the crypto world. According to a US survey involving 745 students above the age of 16 years, it was reported that students taking blockchain or cryptocurrency courses in 2018 had almost doubled in a year. These students have not taken up a major in cryptocurrency courses; rather, they are opting for this as an additional elective course. Incidentally, nearly 56% of the top universities in the world have one course at least on the blockchain or cryptocurrency. For example, Cornell University is known to offer the maximum number of cryptocurrency classes; UC Berkeley and Stanford are not lagging behind. These statistics show a steadily-growing interest amongst students about the blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies in general.
Why should students take up a course in cryptocurrency or the blockchain?
Everything around us is slowly becoming digitalized and it is likely that most of these graduates will be recruited in industries that would have embraced the blockchain in their operations. Blockchain is a leading disruptive technology in the fintech world and seems to be gaining ground every day. According to reports by WinterGreen Research, the blockchain market may have grown slowly, and its use hitherto had been mainly for concealing the funds belonging to terrorist organizations and criminals. But now, it is on the threshold of incredible growth as it paves the way for new digital economic systems. With more and more banks and the finance industry as a whole moving into real-time transactions, the blockchain appears to be a key enabling technology. Students are also trained about the usage of innovative trading platforms like immediate bitcoin. So, students with a background in this will definitely have an edge over their counterparts.
Secondly, the blockchain is likely to encompass all types of industries, whether it is healthcare, law, agriculture, or marketing. No surprises then why more and more students feel the need to get acquainted with this technology to prepare them for employment in any sector. Today, employees must be able to collaborate and work with various departments and the focus is on interdisciplinary research. For instance, cryptocurrency courses are being offered between departments like business, law, and engineering.
According to Dawn Song, professor at Berkeley, expertise will be needed in things like software security and distributed systems but as blockchain is a relatively new technology, there are many questions centering on its regulatory aspects. At the same time, there is enough potential for this technology to create new business models. According to Ferrera, an undergrad at Cornell, there is a lot of interest from the hotel management school, business school, and also the agriculture school about cryptocurrency and blockchain. Professors are also making an effort to learn about these technologies to find out how they can be applied to their respective fields. There are many other students like Ferrera who have benefitted having studied about the blockchain at school. He is now employed as Ava Labs business manager; this is a startup exploring blockchain-driven payment solutions.
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