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Facebook and PayPal Founder to Pay Students to Drop Out

By Ryan Leclaire
  |  
  1 Min Read
Facebook and PayPal Founder to Pay Students to Drop Out
Peter Thiel

Peter Thiel

Years ago, Peter Thiel invested in a young drop-out. His name was Mark Zuckerberg. Today, Facebook is on every college and university campus, and Thiel is offering a fellowship for students to drop out to pursue their big ideas.

He recently unveiled the 2011 20 Under 20 Thiel Fellows, and says higher education may not necessarily be the best path for everyone.

“It’s gotten a lot more expensive than when I attended school a quarter of a century ago,” said Thiel.

“And so, if you look at how much college costs have gone up, you now have people graduating with a quarter million dollars worth of debt and they end up having to spend years or decades paying the debt off.”

Each Fellow will receive mentorship and $100,000 over 2 years, as they pursue their “big ideas” in areas like biotech, career development, economics and finance, education, energy, information technology, mobility, robotics, and space.

“We had planned to award twenty fellowships, but the number of outstanding candidates far exceeded our expectations. It was challenging to select only twenty-four, and impossible to pick only twenty. We’re excited to be working with them, and we hope they will help young people everywhere realize that you don’t need credentials to launch a company that disrupts the status quo.”

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