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Steve Jobs In Praise of Dropping Out
atlacatl writes "Wired reports on Steve Jobs giving a graduation speech: 'Jobs, 50, said he attended Reed College in Portland, Oregon but dropped out after only eight months because it was too expensive for his working-class family. He said his real education started when he "dropped in" on whatever classes interested him -- including calligraphy.' The irony: that most students were graduating. I wouldn't invite him for a high school graduation. Imagine all the 'hard' work teachers, parents and guidance counselors put into brainwashing every kid that he/she must go to University." (Jobs was speaking to the graduates at Stanford University.)
Ug... Job's touting dropping out will undoubtedly start a flurry of "ask.slashdot" questions similar to: Thanks, Steve.
...but a lot more drop out because they are stupid.
Beep beep.
He also dropped acid in his younger days. That a good thing too??
Sounds like good advice to me!
...and it worked for him AND Gates dropped out of Harvard and it worked for him, doesn't mean that it OK for everyone to drop out.
In general University/College is a GOOD thing. However, some people's paths take them elsewhere.
--Mike
Universities are filled with people who are there just because someone felt they had to go to university. If a speech like this makes them question what it is that's really important about a university education, then that's probably more thought-provoking than half the shit they actually DID have to study at university.
Granted, it'd be better as an address to freshmen than the graduating class, but there's still nothing wrong with it.
To anybody who thinks it's stupid for Jobs to play down the importance of a university education, I ask this: what is being done to demonstrate the importance of a university education? Other than talking about the importance of a piece of paper, that is.
I don't think people at stanford need 'brainwashed' into thinking that they should get an education.
I don't think the point of his speech was that dropping out is cool. It was that hard work and determination are what you need to be successful.
Say what you want about Jobs, he's a gifted businessman who knows how to sell. He had the right product in the 70's at the absolute best time.
Your mileage, of course, will vary :).
www.lonseidman.com
School teaches to the lowest common denominator, and rewards conventional and predictable thinking. School is hell for brilliant people, that's why most they can't hack it. But man, if you want to work for others, there's no better place to go then school.
Education != College.
College can provide a wonderful education, if the student is ready for it. I started college when I was 16, but I was too immature even though the "test scores" said otherwise. I needed to grow up, get life experiences. I did these things (though I didn't realize it at the time), and graduated when I was 24.
Had I gotten through school by the time I was 19, which was the pace I was heading, I would have had a college degree and a job I would have hated. Probably would have been found hanging by a rope by now. Instead, I love what I do, and life only gets better by the day.
Summary: College is education for those ready to receive it. Same goes for life in general.
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
Of course, your post completely ignores the real issue: That they shouldn't have gone to college in the first place.
The US has gotten so fixated on sending kids to college that we've lost sight of the reasons why we wanted them there in the first place. As a result, the quality of education has been declining, while the amount of debt our kids pile up before ever starting a job has been rising. And how many of those kids use their college degrees to do amazing things like sell real estate or become plumbers. i.e. What did that degree buy them other than a wad of debt?
That's not to say that education is a bad thing. But people always get the best bang out of an education when they know they want it. Sending them to school before they know what they want to know only devalues it for everyone. Teach your kids to wait until they're ready. Then they can be sure that they really want to take on a college education.
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I never finished college and it has yet to hurt me professionally, financially or emotionally (partly I didn't have the money, mostly I didn't really find it useful for my goals to bother coming up w/ the money - and I went to a good 4 year east coast school with an extremely good comp sci program).
If you're talented, smart, and *most importantly* not lazy, not having a degree doesn't matter in the big scheme of things. With those assets you're more than capable of working around and moving beyond the confines of the traditional 'system' most people end up dealing in (IMO, because they aren't talented enough, smart enough or lack the work ethic to do anything to change things).
Degrees are nice and they do make joining the higher class system (white collar?) easier, but IMO, a lot of people also use degrees as a crutch for rationalizing avoiding the need to do anything meaningful.
If you're talented, smart and actually enjoy hardwork, the world is your oyster. Persuing a degree may even be a distraction from you obtaining your purpose and potential.
$.02
High school was like that for me. Going to college---even state school---was like night and day. Suddenly, the kids who sullenly made it a pain in the ass to be there vanished. I got to learn from people who were really and truly competent; I had the time to take courses that just seemed cool at the time, that probably wouldn't be useful in any future job, but I took them because I wanted to learn about something.
Yes, there were a few fools and charlatans teaching, but I dealt with it; I got to work with some of the cleverest, brightest folks I know.
For me---who'd never known there were other geeks out there---it was a transformative experience.
Clearly, your mileage may vary. But what you get out of school is, at the very least, proportional to what you put into it. Blaming The Man for not hacking it in school is pretty damn weak.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Why do Apple's job listings require four year college degrees then?
Steve Jobs is full of hot air.
Sorry Dude,
That larry ellison speech has been proven to be a fake
Telling people to do that is like telling little kids to drop out of school to become NBA stars... for 99.99% of people, college is a good thing. He got lucky, and suggests more kids do it? Is he gonna bail all their asses out when 99% of them are working in a fucking fast food restaurant for the rest of their miserable lives? What a shortsighted, obnoxious, dick.
Bravo to Jobs for speaking the truth. Universities, American ones anyway, are largely a waste of time. They're commercial enterprises above all, and for that reason they inflate grades to keep students in place and corrupt research in order to attract grants.
I took a four-year degree from a reputable American school and thought it largely a waste of time. I had some worthwhile experiences, but the good parts could have fit into two or three semesters. It was basically a rip-off, and everything I do professionally today is the result of self-education and experience.
When my daughter grows up, I will propose to her that she read and travel (rigorously) instead of taking a formal degree.
If you really want to think "out of the box" there is no better way than tripping. At some point, you will realize you have become the box, and that's when the real learning begins...
I suggest you drop the assumption that an education should result in gainful employment. The world needs well-rounded educated, open-minded, critical thinkers even if their university major didn't lead to employment in the same area. A plumber with a Ph.D.? So be it. A truck driver with a couple of undergrad degrees? Sure. The world is a better place for it, because we -need- plumbers and truck drivers and we -need- educated, broadminded people that aren't simply narrow-minded specialists.
...whether they are prepared for it or not.
College isn't just about the degree and the career. College is about a way of critically evaluating the world around you.
Of course, you get out of it what you put into it, but I'm willing to bet that most everyone who dropped out of college after the first year will wish, within the following ten years, that they had stuck with it.
If you're that weak, it wasn't meant to be.
(/me went to college three years after high school. You'd be suprised how motivating a shit job at minimum wage is.)
It's been a long time.
I don't know about this.
Woz was the engineer that designed and built the Apple II, true. But Steve provided the vision, style, and intuitive grasp of the need for the personal computer. That framework was how Apple grew into a great company. I'm not certain that Woz would've done this alone--I imagine there were plenty of hand-designed computers of that day and age which are rotting away forgotten somewhere, yet are scions of exemplary engineering.
I would say that Woz was probably much luckier to know Steve than the other way around. Without Steve, Woz would have been just another engineer--a talented and remarkable one, yes; but Steve managed to bring a world-altering vision to the table.
That is much rarer than great engineering skills.
I left college after 2 years because I was bored to tears. Joined the Marines. Went back to college 6 years later *highly* motivated and enjoyed the heck out of learning - took CS classes for fun. My fellow undergrads, mostly straight from High School, hated their classes and hated me - I was the jerk who didn't listen to them whine about how hard their schedules were, or how much different classes sucked. My experience - most of them were too immature to appreciate the opportunity they had, and they had insufficient life experience to know that they should feel passionate about anything at all, let alone learning. Long story short - if you are burning up to go to school, go. If you aren't, be honest with yourself and do 'something else' until you figure out what you want to study. Don't let $ keep you back either - I worked my way through school. It is possible, but difficult - and I wouldn't have it any other way. Whatever you do, light your own ass on fire to get something worthwhile done - no one will teach you that. Hard work is it's own best reward.
I am referring to physical good looks. The "Economist", a while back, reported on a study which indicated that height is important and seems to be correlated with financial success. So, too is good looks.
A good example is Pamela Anderson. She has little acting talent, but she managed to latch onto television role after television role.
Contrast her with Meryl Streep. Streep is less attractive but worked very hard to achieve what she accomplished.
Jobs, like Pamela Anderson, is blessed with good looks and a winning personality. Most of us have probably worked with people with such physical endowments. People with them have a much easier time in life than people without them.
Not surprisingly, the average height of a CEO is above the average American height. So is Jobs' height. Before he tells people how they should mimic him, he should first ask the people around him to forgive him for his arrogance.
That being said, I did learn something of great import while in undergrad. After getting mediocre grades throughout I somehow matured a little bit and taught myself how to learn. This was the most important thing I got out of undergrad.
:-)
The part about this that I find so frustrating is that it's such an expensive lesson for kids. I was a home schooler myself, and my mother constantly emphasized that what we learned was less important than learning *how* to learn. While I'm sure that many would take that to mean that she didn't teach us, nothing could be farther from the truth. Rather, I *wanted* to learn many subjects because I had practical uses for them outside of the classroom.
Do you have any idea how cool it is to look at a Trig book and think, "Oh, the raycasting engines I can make with this baby..."
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For every success story you hear, the other 99,999 are never told. For every genius who dropped out of school to become CEO of an multi-national corporation, there are thousands of other geniuses who wound up broke and unhappy.
---Technology will liberate us if it doesn't enslave us first.
The fact is that most people will have to go to college to obtain a successful career. I would imagine that the dropouts who become billionaires would average out to be a statistical fluke.
We live in a different world today than 100 years ago when the elite sent their sons and daughters off to college. Back then, those going to college didn't have to make a living. They already had all the money they needed. They went for pure academic reasons. Your argument is that these circumstances still apply today. They don't.
Today you have a wide middle class instead of just the poor and the rich. Today regular people can go to college. Today regular people can gain successful careers from an otherwise poor upbringing. But today most people must go to college to obtain the standard of living desired.
Sure kids should also want to learn new things and expand their mind. It is still an academic institution, after all. But you cannot discount the fact that the reason parents push their children into going to college is that they need it to survive. And, perhaps, to make sure they don't live in their basement for the rest of their natural born lives. Of yesteryear it may have been normal for children to live their whole lives in the ye ole log cabin.
Things change.
I've thought long and hard about this since graduating from college. I've seen a lot of people do some extraordinary things. The person who runs the division I work in (with about 15,000 people) never went to college, and I'm not sure he graduated from high school. He does happen to be a genius and I suspect he would have went to college if it wasn't for the fact he was successful by the age of 18.
If I interviewed two people for a job I'd always choose the one who had ambition, creativity and a great work ethic. College degrees and intelligence would be secondary. There is a place for that, but with good leadership you can get an ambitious person to do amazing things.
The other factor that counts is common sense. Understanding the requirements of a job and relating to customers is very important. In a sense, everyone works for customers - our bosses are customers of sorts.
For anyone still in school, don't get wrapped up in your GPA but don't drop out of college either.
----- obSig
Many people told me in high school that a college degree is the road to success in life, and I have no doubt that it is. But after going to college for five years I have found that my friends who went straight into the workforce or learned a trade at a community college are now the ones who own houses, cars, and generally have much more money than I do.
On the other hand, my degree allows me to pursue the same quality of life they enjoy, but at a job which will be intellectually challenging and personally rewarding. I just have to wait a bit longer for the tangible benefits.
That said, I don't think it's appropriate to drop out of high school. College, sure, if you find something else you want to do. But for pete's sake, you really should have a high school diploma.
http://www.walkingtaco.com
There's quite a hoopla about Steve's comments. I don't really see it as a "drop out, college is useless" comment that everyone (even the headline) makes it out to be.
More importantly, we need to look deeper into what he said and why he said it. For some people, college probably is a waste of time. If he had stayed in college (pressure from family, etc), maybe Apple never would have come to be. Maybe he would have lost all motivation or thinking differently and would have graduated with his degree and got a job as an accountant or programmer somewhere. For Steve, his personality conflicted with the structured ways of university learning. For others, it could be the kiss of death to not get that college degree. Some people need need the schooling to mature a bit. I'm glad he dropped out, scraped for food, and was willing to do whatever it took to survive and to take his "beleaguered company" back.
"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts...for support rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang
The real lesson should be that you don't need a college degree to be successful ..... but it helps. Stories like this spur people on to believe things like "School is for suckers, I'm going to go make it on my own". For every Steve Jobs, there's a million people who end up working menial jobs at a pathetic salary because they didn't persue their education. Getting an education and getting a good job isn't going to make you a millionare, but more likely than not it'll keep you from being destitue.
College degrees today are quickly becoming what high school degrees were 40 years ago. Advancement in your job is linked to how much education you've gotten. Whether you know more or not is irrelevant, but having degrees count. I have a friend who is a Lt in the Air Force. He's been telling me how a masters degree is quickly becoming a requirement in order to advance into the higher ranks in his department (He's not in R&D or a repair unit or anything like that either). Another example, a few years back another friend of mine was working a summer job for the county doing road maintainence (AKA, scooping up roadkill). Since he wasn't a total screwball like the other full-timers, he got along well with his supervisor. They were discussing my friend's future at some point. My friend wanted to (and did) go to music school, but the supervisor said that if he wanted, after graduation from college, he could recommend him for a supervisor's job working for the county. When my friend asked how a degree in Music Education would be useful working for the county, the supervisor said the degree itself didn't matter, just that you had it. His own degree was in agracultural sciences. So for most mainstream people, a college degree is the best course of action. Maybe you don't have to go into your major's field, but overall you'll be better of having it.
The issue of working your way through college is confused greatly when the type of college in question is ommitted. In state colleges, or at least in the ones near my home town and the ones near my college,
In private colleges or the Ivy league types (not just those colleges but colleges of that type) a 'work my way through' attitude will result in taking part time classes for years (and years and years and years)
Honestly, Steve is my hero, and this is why. The guy didn't have a product, great technical understand, business skills, personal or social skills. And if he was a visionary, then what was his vision? No, Steve Jobs made his money as a philosopher. He had the philosophy that every computer should be simple enough for the average human to use, and it should be beautiful. Of all the things Steve has fucked up over the years, this one philosophy has remained, and he has carried Apple on this alone.
there is also someone named Gates.
No one ever had to evacuate a city because the solar panels broke!
Why should students go and spend their money when they don't know what they want to be. University isn't a direction to help. It's a money pit. Wandering aimlessly through useless courses as you pay for them is a bad idea. There is no hurry to jump in to university straight out of school. Hell, technical colleges are starting to have a better job hiring rate after graduation than most university courses do. Even the 'prestige' ones such as engineering.
Seriously, kids are lead too easily into things they don't understand. Take me for instance. I got suckered. Go into engineer, do computers, big market, lots of money, you're good at math. What a load of shit. Tables turned. Underpaid, overworked, jobs are going overseas or you have to have experience no company will give you an oppurtunity to get. Too much time and money to train someone these days. Well, back to school to become an teacher. And this is my choice.
ogg
Black cat, searing pain, flames...? I must be in Heaven! - Homer Simpson
Of course, the atomic bomb is responsible for saving more lives than any other thing in history.
Great I'll tell this to all the victims of your mindless bombing of two cities with dense population in close succession in Japan. They'll thank me and the US for saving so many lives.
Or do you think the lack of a World War III is just a coincidence?
Just because there was no World War III proves that atomic bombs have prevented it? Cool line of reasoning.
I tell you a secret. The fact that there was no World War III is solely because I am wearing grey socks on weekdays and ones with holes in them on the weekend (ever heard of the magic chaos butterfly? It's actually me and I'm always compensating).
There are two rules for success:
1. Never tell everything you know.
It's a fair question. And here are some answers.
A college degree is not a commodity (yet); it is not like 87 octane gasoline dispensed at the pump. The college degree represents a period of time in which you study a lot of useless things in the hope that some of them will surprise you by being interesting; that the depressing or boring things will at least teach you how to wade through depressing or boring material for the rest of your life. It is a period of time when people stop being te
From what I can tell, it was use The Bomb, or invade Japan. Estimated losses of allied forces invading Japan were gigantic. It was hardly mindless, it was simply a case of Us vs. Them. In that particular point in history, it was them. You don't have 4 years of war and then say, "Hell, we don't need to prove to them that we're capable of leveling their cities, lets just keep killing our troops for a few more years - we'll win eventually." You drop the damn Bomb, twice, to show the other side that you can make them, and they should really consider surrender.
And the fact is that once The Bomb was about, there were lot of times where major powers would have usually gone to war, but were held back by The Bomb.
So, for the sacrifice of 110,000 people, countless others got the chance to live.
You are in a twisty maze of processor lines, all alike.
There is a lot of hype here.
Look on job sites. Almost every decent vacancy requires a degree, some with a minimum of a 2:1.
A lot of people on here seem to think they are 'above' getting a degree, that they're too smart for that and after school they can just stroll into a job because of their enormous intelligence. That only works for a very, very small number of people.
A degree shows that you at least have a basic understanding of the subject, and have spent a lot of money, time and effort in the subject area of your choice. Who in their right mind would employ some kid into a reponsible job who had just finished school, had no proof that he knew shit, and had the arrogance to think he didn't need a degree?
A degree also shows that you have a commitment to the field in which you're pursuing. After all, you don't spend 4+ years studying something that you're not really interested in doing. When the option was presented to me to earn my master's degree in Electrical engineering after I finished undergraduate work, I jumped at it. And I'm glad I did; it's bumped me ahead of the pack (and those l33t kiddies) when it comes to getting a job and subsequent promotions. As someone who regularly interviews people for positions at my company, I don't just blindly say "Whoa, PhD...he's the man!". A degree, or multiple degrees, are only part of the picture of a job candidate. Oftentimes, if one candidate comes in with a BS with some co-op or intern experience, and another with an MS and no experience, the BS candidate will be chosen, as the "on the job" learning they acquired is often as valuable, if not more so, than the additional degree.
They never say that dropping out of college will help you get a job - ever notice that these highly successful college dropouts started their own company and didn't go to work for someone else? There's a lesson in there for you.