Personal Foundations
There comes a time in every young adult life where he has to learn to make his own decisions. In order to make sound decisions, an individual must do our research and gather all the facts. A person’s background, in addition to research and lessons he has learned throughout his life is what forms his Personal Foundations. In my Foundations of Student Affairs course, we read an article, by Ben Wieder, on a unique fellowship opportunity Peter Thiel gave a select few of students. Peter Thiel is a co-founder of PayPal. He selected 24 out of 400 candidates who applied for the fellowship and offered them $100,000 to leave their educational institute and pursue entrepreneurship by developing their business ideas. These students were enrolled in prominent institutions including Harvard University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Stanford university, just to name a few. These chosen candidates were to work with a network of more than 100 Silicon Valley mentors to further develop their ideas in their pespective area. Some of these areas included biotechnology, education, aerospace, energy, as well, as some humanities specifications. This opportunity allowed the students to pursue their dreams without accumulating thousands in debt in the form of student loans.
The Fellowship was designed to help the students develop their ideas quicker than they would in a traditional educational setting, thus assisting them in reaching their career goal faster. All students that were originally selected did not accept the fellowship offer. Some decided it would be more beneficial for them to continue their traditional education and obtain their degree. While some were in favor of the fellowship because they did not believe a degree always equated to having a job. I wrote a pros and cons paper on if college is really worth the cost.