You don't need to go to University to be successful

Teenagers have grown up being taught that they have to go to University to be successful., but there are many people as young as 18 who didn't go to university, and are multi - becoming millionaires by their own hard work. A few examples:

Jack Cator, created HideMyAss and sold it for £40 million
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-32702501

Nick D'Aloisio created the Summly app, sold it to Yahoo for £30 million
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21934188

Chance Morris (Twitch streamer), makes about $350k a year

The many, many young Youtube content creators (Tom Syndicate, Harry Shaw etc.)

Of course, if you go to a good Uni you may end up becoming a high up Lawyer / investment banker / doctor. But you most likely won't become a millionaire until you're at least 30. These people are making millions and are as young as 18 years old. To be as successful as these people you obviously need to have a lot of luck or intelligence, but it just shows that you don't need to have a degree to achieve great success, which is what society is teaching young people. Education is important, but I think we should also teach children about innovation and programming

(edited 8 years ago)

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Reply 1

nucdev

Very true.

However, if you make it big at a young age and then say, lose it all, at least with a degree you'll have something to fall back on to get a OK job whilst you try again to replicate that success.

Reply 2

username638250

Original post by zigglr

Teenagers have grown up being taught that they have to go to University to be successful., but there are many people as young as 18 who didn't go to university, and are multi - becoming millionaires by their own hard work. A few examples:

Jack Cator, created HideMyAss and sold it for £40 million
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-32702501

Nick D'Aloisio created the Summly app, sold it to Yahoo for £30 million
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21934188

Chance Morris (Twitch streamer), makes about $350k a month

The many, many young Youtube content creators (Tom Syndicate, Harry Shaw etc.)

Of course, if you go to a good Uni you may end up becoming a high up Lawyer / investment banker / doctor. But you most likely won't become a millionaire until you're at least 30. These people are making millions and are as young as 18 years old. To be as successful as these people you obviously need to have a lot of luck or intelligence, but it just shows that you don't need to have a degree to achieve great success, which is what society thinks

Nick D'Aloisio is actually at Oxford. I have mutual friends.
Also he did receive a top education (he went to KCS Wimbledon) so had an edge over the others in terms of his background.
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(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 3

zigglr

Original post by yl95

Nick D'Aloisio is actually at Oxford. I have mutual friends.Also he did receive a top education (he went to KCS Wimbledon) so had an edge over the others in terms of his background.Posted from TSR Mobile

But he made his app and became a millionaire before he went to university, and he said in an interview that he taught himself programming via the Internet

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 4

VannR

You can add Richard Branson to that list.

Reply 5

zigglr

Original post by VannR

You can add Richard Branson to that list.

Was mainly focusing on current day teenagers who have become millionaires

Reply 6

Alex0101

Yeah of course, but remember that in uni you can get to meet people who have same goals. Not even Uni I mean places with "students", like Zuckerberg, Damon Albarn, etc... But also this kind of people start working on the "industry" of preference and develop themselves with a tad of luck and good ideas, contacts.
Really depends on your idea of success and happiness. . .

Reply 7

Philbert

You don't have to be a millionaire to be successful. Got any more realistic examples?

My cousin did a plumbing apprenticeship about 6 years ago and is on at least £45k. That's probably more than I'll earn for a long time (if ever) and I'm about to start a PhD.

Reply 8

amachine

success is subjective

Reply 9

vis break

But aren't they a success because they made it in either computing or video making?
You probably have more of a chance making money after getting a degree than you will uploading noscope vidya's to yt.

Reply 10

Underscore__

You missed out Mike Ashley, Sir Richard Branson and Lord Sugar who are probably the three richest and most successful British people without a university degree

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Reply 11

DJKL

This all boils down to probability.

There are always going to be outlying results in any sample, and plucking the winners out post event is a tad skewed anyway (we don't know the names of the 999,999 who did not go to university or their individual outcomes), but try it with a random 1,000 or 10,000 or 100,000 or 1,000,000 people and the picture does tend to become clearer.

In the absence of inherited wealth education does on average lead to a more financially successful career, whether it should be at university is however another matter.

Reply 12

SurreyJake

You're forgetting not everybody goes for a job and some go for the experience!!! :tongue:

Reply 13

Obstrepherous

It's a shame schools have such a 'set in stone' cirriculum and don't teach children / teenagers about innovation and programming

Reply 14

tomfailinghelp

Original post by zigglr

This is just false, if anything the opposite is true: we grow up being told that 'X never went to Uni and is a millionaire', or 'Y dropped out of Uni and is successful', or 'graduates just end up working in Costa with loads of debt'.

Seriously, nobody other than the irredeemably stupid thinks that Uni is a ticket to success - the general idea that people receive from school is far more pessimistic than even reality warrants.

Reply 15

El Salvador

How about Miley Cyrus? Rihanna? Taylor Swift? Justin Bieber? Shakira? Hilary Duff?

These are all irrelevant. Of course you don't have to go to university in order to be successful. In fact, you don't have to have anything apart from being alive - you can very well win the lottery.

The truth of the matter is most of us are not going to be exceptional people and on average, a university graduate earns a lot more.
.

Reply 16

sqwertylol

more likely to be successful if you go to uni.
most people need qualifications to become successful. they are people like richard branson and alan sugar who have great business minds and thus didn't need university. there arent many of them though. most of us need some qualifications because we cannot become successful on our mindset and decision making alone - like alan sugar can

Reply 17

jimmy_looks_2ice

You need to go to university to have a university experience. Afaik, that's the sole thing you can only get from university. You don't even need to go to uni to do a degree, since you can study for one through the OU.

As stated, success is an entirely subjective concept, plus there's the fact that luck plays a crucial role in the success of some of these entrepreneurs - and that's something you can't control.

(edited 8 years ago)

Reply 18

zigglr

Original post by tomfailinghelp

How is it false? Schools constantly remind their students that they have to work hard to get onto a good course at good uni otherwise they won't have success, and parents often encourage this as well

Reply 19

Underscore__

Original post by Little Toy Gun

It's quite different when you talk about musicians, that's not something attainable for most. Having your own company which just makes you a good income, nothing too crazy, is a much more realistic goal

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