Chris Keenan
Photo Credit: Rensselaer/Mark McCarty

Troy, N.Y. — During the month of May, more than 1.5 million high school students in more than 100 countries will be sharpening their pencils and stocking up on pens as they prepare to take the annual College Board Advanced Placement exams. To help reduce their stress and anxieties, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Class of 2008 graduate and budding entrepreneur Chris Keenan offers a solution — a free online study resource to help students tackle the AP courses and exams. 

Keenan came up with the idea to develop the Web site, called Course-Notes.Org, while he was in still in high school. At the time, he was a 15-year-old student struggling to find online resources to aid in studying for his AP exams. In 2002, using his frustration as a catalyst to come up with a solution, he created the Web site with its lone subject offering in U.S. history, and shared it with his high school classmates and friends. It became an instant hit.

“In its first year of operation, the site reached the top 10 for any relevant search engine queries, received more than six million page views per month, and generated feedback from students all over the country,” Keenan said. 

This month, officials estimate that high school students will take more than 2,750,000 exams. The College Board’s Advanced Placement Program® enables students to pursue college-level studies while still in high school, according to the organization. Thirty-seven courses in 22 subject areas are offered. More than 3,600 colleges and universities around the world recognize AP for credit, placement, and/or admissions decisions, including more than 90 percent of four-year colleges and universities in the United States. 

Noting that college was part of his future plans, Keenan, who hails from Chicago, Ill., decided to pursue a degree in management at Rensselaer’s Lally School of Management & Technology, with the hope of turning his class project into a viable business.  

Now, graduating after only three years and armed with knowledge from his management courses, confidence in his core competencies, and advice and mentorship from a host of business experts at the Lally School, Keenan credits his business-savvy and current success to his undergraduate experience as a management major.

Today, his Web site offers resources for 15 different subjects that are commonly offered at high schools around the country.  Subjects include: U.S. history, U.S. government and politics, European history, and psychology, along with notes, outlines, vocabulary terms, practice tests, biographies, timelines, political parties, study guides, and historical documents. In addition, the Web site’s forum provides assistance to more than 70,000 members who can receive help with homework, debate current events, or just discuss daily life topics like applying to college or tips for studying, among others. 

“More schools are offering a greater variety of AP courses, so it’s not uncommon for students to be taking several AP courses in one year,” said Don Yanek of Chicago’s Northside College Prep, and Keenan’s teacher for the Intro to Computer Programming, AP Computer Programming course. “This creates a real crunch time for them at the end of April and the start of May to begin to prepare for these exams. It’s great that students have a reliable central site for a large assortment of quality preparation materials in addition to the College Board published materials. Having access to this free information takes a little bit of the pressure off the students.” 

“It was never my intention to start a business; this really started off as project to help myself and others,” Keenan said. “Things changed when I recognized that people were finding value in what I was doing and that inspired me to continue, and seek better ways to improve the free service that I was offering to students and teachers.” 

While at Rensselaer, Frank Wright, clinical assistant professor and director of the undergraduate program in the Lally School of Management & Technology, served as an adviser and mentor to Keenan. Wright noted that when Chris first started classes, he already knew of Benjamin Disraeli, an 18th British Conservative statesman and literary figure whose notion stated that “Knowledge must be gained by ourselves. Mankind may supply us with the facts; but the results, even if they agree with previous ones, must be the work of our mind.” 

“As Keenan accelerated through his undergraduate courses he found that ‘mankind supplied’ knowledge and skill galvanized his entrepreneurial attitude… that his ‘work of his mind,’ his enterprise, contributed to ‘society’… profitably.  He was as impatient as he was impressive.  Just look at him now!” Wright said. 

“I remember that when I first started the Web site, every dollar that I spent came out of my back pocket,” Keenan said. “I only purchased software or services that I needed, and started selling advertising about a year after I launched the Web site to generate revenue to keep things running.” 

These days, the Web site has also grown in its brand recognition, leading to an increase in advertising revenue for 2007 of more than $65,000, Keenan noted. Some of the advertisers include ABC Family, Cartoon Network, Clinique, MTV, Staples, and Harvard Business School, along with advertisers that have used the Web site to promote new movie releases like Hairspray, Night at the Museum, Juno, and Lord of the Rings as well as CD releases from artists like Chris Brown, Fall Out Boy, Keyshia Cole, and Rascal Flatts to name a few. 

Fostering entrepreneurship is one of the main thrusts of The Rensselaer Plan, the Institute’s blueprint for success. The plan calls for infusing understanding and encouragement of entrepreneurship throughout all five academic schools and student programs, and cultivating a campus culture that motivates students and graduates to pursue commercialization and enterprise-building activities.

Keenan noted that there are many lessons that he has learned not only as a student at Rensselaer but also as a budding entrepreneur.  So what are his parting words? “Let your passion drive you, and your wisdom guide you down your path to success,” said Keenan. “Take what you’ve learned not just in the classrooms, but also what you learn through your interactions with not just the professors and students, but also the lunch lady and the janitor. There is something that you can learn from everyone. Most importantly, never be afraid to ask for help no matter how small or big the request, and know that there are many benefits to be gained from networking with others.”

Upon graduation, Keenan will work for Johnson & Johnson in their Information Technology Leadership Development Program that allows participants to put their skills to the test across a range of companies and applications within their global enterprise. He also still plans to manage his business.

To view the Web site, go to:  http://www.course-notes.org/

Contact: Jessica Otitigbe
Phone: (518) 276-6050
E-mail: otitij@rpi.edu