If your dream is going to a university like Harvard, Yale, or Princeton, then just do it. But if your passion is following your dream, then the Thiel Fellowship might be for you. On one hand, you must consider the cost and time of attending a major school, and on the other hand you must think about failure. In Media Imam’s USA Today article “Thiel Fellowship get young entrepreneurs going,” he shares the good and the bad of dropping out of school for 100,000 dollars.
So you think being a Silicon Valley whiz kid is all that and a bag of chips, well it’s not. “Being a 19 year old start-up founder is not as cool or as fun as it sounds”, says Mark Daniel, a 2013 fellow and co-founder of Strut. “You have to do a lot of soul searching, a lot of trial and error to find your grove. Basically, Daniel is calming this is not for the faint of hearts; this is my story as well. I thought going to college would be the shit, hang out and meet woman. Then I soon realize how hard it was, I had to be honest with myself and dig deep to my inner most self and say (how much do you want this Don). Their always times in your life were you have doubt and must be real with yourself and ask those questions. Daniel said “People should approach it with, I’m dropping out of college to be a full time entrepreneur, and there is no glamour in that”. Daniels point is that, this is no kitty ride; you must suit up and show up. Additionally college is also very intense and has rough times (midterms/finals).
To further illustrate, Noor Siddiqul, a 2012 fellow, agrees with Daniel, remembering periods of negativity while running her health care it company called Remedy. She to admit this is tough to do, “But life, just like entrepreneurship, is getting up more times than you fall.” In making this comment, Siddiqul argues that sometimes you take 2 steps forward and 1 step backwards. I do this all the time in life, but I take those experiences and keep the one I can use and store the others for future reference. Another example is we must put a 100% into are dreams and don’t let anything get in your way. To be or not to be, to be for me.
Likewise, with hardship, pain, and long hours comes some positive as well. Siddiqul and Daniel feel lucky to have received the chance to build their dreams. In other words, they both believe that this was a once in a life time opportunity, they took the bull by the horns and ran with it. Siddiqul says “I found a community of ambitious and like-minded peers as well as a network of mentors.” Siddiqul supports her point that being part of this kind of a project is without parallel by referencing the peers and network of people she has met. “Fellows also are grateful to the program for giving them the time and money-and freedom-to develop their projects. Unlike college, the Thiel Fellowship leaves it up to the participants to decide their daily schedule. Thiel is insisting that the young whiz kids of tomorrow know what they need to follow their dreams, not us.
In addition to freedom to be yourself and follow your heart and mind, this weird science study give these kids the money to do it now, not wait four years and be in debt tens of thousands dollars by the time you get out of school. College is good for guys like me who don’t know anything and not sure want they want to be when they grow up, but I say if you are one of those few child prodigies take the money now and help save this world today, not years from now.
Sometimes you take two steps forward and one step backwards. I do this all the time in life, but I take those experiences and keep the one I can use and store the others for future reference. Another example is we must put a 100% into are dreams and don’t let anything get in your way. To be or not to be, to be for me.
