Markets with Madison
00:23:34 · Madison, Jamie Beaton
[00:23:34] S0: You are a lifelong learner. You're also now becoming a professor at the Auckland University through their entrepreneurialism degree. Do you feel like you also want to educate when you have enough on your plate running a unicorn business? [00:23:49] S1: You know, I'm really passionate about helping more young Kiwis launch companies. When I went through high school, the idea of entrepreneurship really never even entered my lexicon as something that I could do. I always thought actually entrepreneurship was what you said if you were unemployed. And my mom... I mean it is, isn't it? Yeah, until it gets cold. But, you know, I saw this and I thought, you know, want more young Kiwis launching companies. And I actually think in New Zealand right now, we're not capital constrained anymore. We're actually entrepreneur constrained. How many folks want to go out there and swing big and eat the glass and build these great companies? And so the idea is I'm going to teach these 18 year olds with Fengzhou as soon as they come into the university about what it's like to build these companies and hopefully change their career direction from say going off to a big four, which I love, but building more companies. So that's really the ambition. [00:24:35] S0: Given Jamie and I both talk at 2x speed, in the hours we spend together in New York, we covered a lot. But there's one topic that seems to occupy a significant segment of his brain. Is that your long term play, politics?
00:24:35 · Madison, Jamie Beaton
[00:24:35] S0: Given Jamie and I both talk at 2x speed, in the hours we spend together in New York, we covered a lot. But there's one topic that seems to occupy a significant segment of his brain. Is that your long term play, politics? [00:24:47] S1: I think I'll be building for a long time to come. Yeah. I think nothing is quite as fun as entrepreneurship where you can, you know, see an opportunity in the world and go build it, rally a team behind it. And, you know, I guess education's always really fueled my fires. [00:25:01] S0: In America, the line between education and politics can be blurry and is especially so under this administration. I'm interested in if you have a view on the, some would say, ideological hijacking of these education institutions like Ivy League, Harvard, Stanford. Is that something you've personally experienced being at these institutions? And if so, what's your view on what that means to education?
00:25:25 · Jamie Beaton, Madison
[00:25:25] S1: So I guess, I think about my time at, say, Harvard undergrad, I took all these classes in areas from math to stats to finance to business to entrepreneurship. Very few of them have any kind of political exposure in general, and so I think for the typical student, you don't really see politics into the classroom almost at all. Even in international relations or government style class, still not that much. I think where you see it sometimes is in debates or in campus protests or if you go and join political clubs like the Republicans on campus. At Yale Law, they have things like, for example, the Federalist Society. And if you join that, you sort of yell to the campus that you're a Republican and you're really proud of that, and that will trigger a bit of animosity sometimes, but on the whole I would say it's quite exaggerated. From an ideological standpoint, about 92% of undergrads at Harvard are Democratic voters, and so you do, of course, have that skew, but also international students tend to have a pretty balanced, you know, neutral view as well. And so on the whole, I wouldn't say it's as highly charged as it seems. A lot of the protests are about, certain issues like Israel Palestine. But if you're just a Republican guy rolling around or girl, you can have a pretty chill four years. [00:26:28] S0: What about that from the top down, though? Have you noticed or witnessed at all any ideological views stemming from educators
00:26:28 · Madison, Jamie Beaton
[00:26:28] S0: What about that from the top down, though? Have you noticed or witnessed at all any ideological views stemming from educators [00:26:37] S1: Good in these question. So I would say the presidents are usually very almost politician like in their... Well, I should say diplomatic like in their in their neutrality. So they don't really have any sort of partisan smearing. Even when Trump is saying things that, you know, are really attacking higher education, few university presidents will actually speak about that. They'll generally opt for a more diplomatic tact and a lot of their public comments are about, you know, the general value of academic research or inquiry, so I would say no, I haven't seen all that much. The only class I can think of would be my Yale Law seminar on advanced contracts with Amy Chua, and you know, she famously has helped lots of folks get Supreme Court clerkships, which is quite a political process, and within that class she actively calls on people across different sides of the political aisle and encourages that free flowing debate. But I think that's actually a good example of kind of what you want in the university, which is a relatively safe debating chamber for different ideas. And so I love that, I thought it was a fun experience.
00:26:37 · Jamie Beaton, Madison
[00:26:37] S1: Good in these question. So I would say the presidents are usually very almost politician like in their... Well, I should say diplomatic like in their in their neutrality. So they don't really have any sort of partisan smearing. Even when Trump is saying things that, you know, are really attacking higher education, few university presidents will actually speak about that. They'll generally opt for a more diplomatic tact and a lot of their public comments are about, you know, the general value of academic research or inquiry, so I would say no, I haven't seen all that much. The only class I can think of would be my Yale Law seminar on advanced contracts with Amy Chua, and you know, she famously has helped lots of folks get Supreme Court clerkships, which is quite a political process, and within that class she actively calls on people across different sides of the political aisle and encourages that free flowing debate. But I think that's actually a good example of kind of what you want in the university, which is a relatively safe debating chamber for different ideas. And so I love that, I thought it was a fun experience. [00:27:33] S0: On recent administration Spicy stuff. Alterations to education, specifically international student intake, do you have a view on what that means for education and also for your business, which relies, this entire business really relies on putting these international students into these education institutions in America. Could that completely disrupt what you're doing?
00:27:55 · Jamie Beaton, Madison
[00:27:55] S1: Yeah, it's a great question. So I would say a couple of things. There's three shocks so far. One is Trump saying he might ban Chinese students. The second is saying he might ban all international students from Harvard. And the third is freezing visa interviews. So first of all, for... Let's take the Chinese students. He recently announced that actually all Chinese students are open to come to America, and that was part of the trade tussle with Xi Jinping. So I think that was a classic Trump strategy where he initially announced this sort of scary thing to put pressure on China, but then walked it back entirely. Similarly for Harvard, they've won two lawsuits now to keep their right for international students, and so I think they will be able to take students all fine. We're of course helping kids this year who are sort of nervously waiting to begin this class, but I think that should also be okay. Then finally, there's the visa interviews. Unfortunately, this year's Kiwis largely have their visa interviews already scheduled at the embassy, so they should be able to get their student visas. But if that stuck around for a while, that could be a bit spicy. But on the whole, seems like it's de escalating quite a bit. [00:28:48] S0: You're an international student at these institutions. How would your life be different if you didn't get to have that experience? [00:28:56] S1: Yeah, I mean, well, selfishly, I've already knocked out a lot [00:28:59] S0: of my studies,