Through the launch of his 20 Under 20 Fellowship initiative, billionaire entrepreneur and hedge funder Peter Thiel is engaging in one of the most radical experiments yet about the future of American higher education. He is, essentially, paying 20 of the best and brightest students in the country to drop out of college and, instead, to move to Silicon Valley to pursue their personal entrepreneurial passions for two years. He is bankrolling each of the students to the tune of $100,000 each, hoping that the combination of youth, passion, genius and a significant amount of capital backing will result in truly world-changing innovations. Instead of getting tied down with tens of thousands of dollars in student loan debt, these college students will have two years of freedom to pursue their entrepreneurial passion. Is this the new American dream?
It's hard to ignore that we're currently in the middle of a fundamental change in the way that we think about higher education. A number of significant trends - like the skyrocketing cost of a college education and the emergence of new, distributed models of learning across the Internet - have led many to challenge the conventional wisdom of plunking down $100,000 or more for a four-year college education - especially if that pricey college education means that you'll basically have to become an indentured servant on Wall Street if you ever want to pay off all your student debt. (This assumes, of course, that your last name is not Rockefeller or Forbes or Gates)
To read the full, original article click on this link: The Dream of Becoming an Ivy League Drop-Out | Endless Innovation | Big Think
Author: Dominic Basulto
