I am modeling my No-Pay MBA on top-flight MBA programs such as Harvard, Stanford, UPenn, and MIT. The first year of a degree program at these universities typically focuses on fundamentals. The second year, students get to take more elective courses.

If you aren't fully convinced that free online degrees are the way of the future, neither am I. I received a tremendous amount of value from both my undergraduate and my graduate experiences, and I wouldn't trade those experiences in for a free degree earned from the comfort of my bedroom. There is no true substitute for the classroom environment, for realtime exchanges between teacher and student, for lively face-to-face discussion. So I'm certainly not saying there isn't any value to a traditional MBA. However, given my particular situation, the numbers just don't add up. For me - and, I would expect, for many others - a free online degree seems like the way to go.

Would it be possible to create my own MBA using free online courses and other cheap or free materials? I've looked at what's out there, from Coursera to ItunesU to TEDTalks. These resources may be relatively new, but there is a ton of material out there. Many of the courses on Coursera even operate like real college courses - with homework assignments and discussion groups. I've compared the free course offerings to the curricula of top business schools. And the answer I've come to is this: Yes, it is possible. And I'm going to try.