Slashdot Mirror
PayPal Co-Founder Gives Out $100,000 To Not Go To College
Paypal co-founder Peter Thiel says the key to quicker business innovation is skipping college. His foundation is handing out $100,000 to 24 people under 20 to drop out of college for two years and start companies. From the press release: "As the first members of the 20 Under 20 Thiel Fellowship, the Fellows will pursue innovative scientific and technical projects, learn entrepreneurship, and begin to build the technology companies of tomorrow. During their two-year tenure, each Fellow will receive $100,000 from the Thiel Foundation as well as mentorship from the Foundation’s network of tech entrepreneurs and innovators. The project areas for this class of fellows include biotech, career development, economics and finance, education, energy, information technology, mobility, robotics, and space."
IF you want to be an executive? he is 100% correct.
All you need to do is schmooze and network to get your name known by rich people. Abilities and skills are not important, It's who you know not what you know.
If you want to be a productive citizen that actually does things? College is a good idea.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Unfortunately, pretty much every school I've visited requires that you do 'N' credits of something you don't love because some ass-hat thought that college kids need to take 'N' credits of something other than focused study.
Oh, my God, how DARE anyone think that a University degree ought to mean you've had a well-rounded diverse education and got a perspective on the world larger than yourself!
If I could go to a college right now and study only computer languages and computer science while skipping all the other stuff ...
Go to a trade school if you want to learn a trade. Go to a University if you want a university education. If you don't want the degree but can't find a trade school, take just the classes you want and walk away.
Yes, the concept that University isn't the natural followup to high school has been screwed by high school counselors who are rated by the "success" of their gradutes at getting into Uni.
I left school because I hated attending classes that I had no interest in.
A perfectly valid decision which doesn't prove that the Uni needs to change what it teaches, only that you needed to change your perception of what Uni was all about. Not every place needs to be just the right place for you.