ToyBox Consulting

Anyone building a business, listen up: Stanford is offering 16 free, online courses for anyone looking to pick up a few extra skills. The courses include some technology and entrepreneurship-based subjects that could help you get that edge you need.

Stanford University is the institution for entrepreneurship. In its history, the university spit out notable alumni such as Vint Cerf, now vice president and chief Internet evangelist at Google, Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, William Hewlett and David Packard of HP, and a number of recognizable technology enthusiasts.

It encourages students to start businesses, and offers courses to that end. Now it’s offering 16 free courses with focuses in business, entrepreneurship, technology, and science. But you don’t have to be a full-time student at Stanford to take advantage. The university says, “the courses are open to anyone with a computer, anywhere.”

For nine of these courses, Stanford is using Coursera, which partners with universities across the country to organize and launch free courses. It thus far has 16 participating universities, in addition to $16 million in its first round of funding. “Writing in the Sciences” and “Human-Computer Interaction” are two of Stanford’s courses being hosted by the startup.

There are a number of courses that could come in handy for someone trying to start a business in the Valley. Here’s a list of what’s coming up this fall:

1. Machine Learning with Professor Andrew Ng, starting August 20

2. Cryptography with Professor Dan Boneh, starting August 27

3. Introduction to Mathematical Thinking with Professor Keith Devlin, startingSeptember 17

4. Probabilistic Graphical Models with Professor Daphne Koller, starting September 24

5. Human-Computer Interaction with Professor Scott Klemmer, starting September 24

6. Introduction to Logic with Professor Michael Genesereth, starting September 24

7. Organizational Analysis with Professor Dan McFarland, starting September 24

8. Writing in the Sciences with Professor Kristin Sainani, starting September 24

9. Algorithms: Design and Analysis, Part 2 with Professor Tim Roughgarden starting inOctober

10. Technology Entrepreneurship with Professor Chuck Eesley, starting in the fall

11. A Crash Course on Creativity with Professor Tina Seelig, starting in the fall

12. Designing a New Learning Environment with Professor Paul Kim, starting in the fall

13. Finance with Professor Kay Giesecke, starting in the fall

14. Startup Boards: Advanced Entrepreneurship with Professor Clint Korver, starting in the fall

15. Solar Cells, Fuel Cells and Batteries with Professor Bruce Clemens, starting October 8

16. An Introduction to Computer Networks with Professors Nick McKeown and Philip Levis, starting October 8