College unrequirements
When I was growing up, if you were a certain kind of student, college was a given. You worked hard to get the best grades in school, stacked yourself with the right extracurriculars, took the SAT, and got into the best college you could. (We also walked to school in the snow, uphill both ways, obviously.)
But among my three teenagers, only one wants to pursue a career where higher education is an obvious requirement (psychiatrist). Another wants to be a stage manager, a job for which people traditionally go to college, but not always. The third has no idea what she wants, but she has talked about skipping college entirely.
Of course, teenagers change their minds. For that matter, adults change their minds too. I have personally changed my mind a lot across my career. But my kids and their friends are thinking about education differently than people did a generation ago, and it isn't just the same old career change conversation.
Do as I do, not as I say
You can't read so-called thought leadership from tech people without drowning in "college is overrated" hot takes. I discount these hot takes, and you should too. I don't know any "college is overrated" tech execs who are pushing their own kids to skip college.
Lots of leaders (me included) no longer care about a college degree in tech hiring. That part is legit. But scratch below the surface of the hot takes, and the honest sentiment is, "College is overrated for everyone else, but I will do what it takes to get my kid into Stanford."
Talking to teenagers directly gives a much clearer picture. And for many students, especially those who would need to take on debt to get a degree, the value of college is just not clear.
Mind the gap
This year, my kids connected me with 15 high school grads from the class of 2026 who are taking gap years. All were admitted to schools like MIT, Penn, UCLA, UW, and Yale, and all elected to defer admission for a year.
These students either went to private schools or were at the top of their classes in excellent public schools. They did the honors classes, won the debate tournaments and sports championships, made the service trips, published research. In other words, they had a lot of options.
Among the 15 graduates, only three intend to spend the year doing traditional gap year activities; one is teaching English abroad, one is going to be a ski instructor, and a third (lucky) kid is traveling the world.
Three of the graduates are attempting to build creator-influencer careers. Two are off to a good enough start that it does not seem far-fetched.
The other nine graduates are planning to start companies or non-profits. If their founding efforts work, they intend to skip college. If their companies don't work, they will consider taking their experience to another company. Many consider college a last resort.
A decade ago, these high-achieving 18yos would have been matriculating at elite institutions in the fall. They are just no longer convinced about the economics of college.
Bring on that entrepreneurial energy
My kids do not want to work in tech, but all three have strong entrepreneurial interests. Every one of them talks about their future with self-employment or business ownership in mind. They grew up seeing their parents as founders, and I always thought this was part of their interest. But talking to their friends, I think it might be more generational.
One of the budding entrepreneurs explained it to me. "AI makes college irrelevant," he asserted. "I can build things without being taught. I can earn money right away. And anyway, the teaching is slop, the student work is slop. Total waste of money." Many of the gap-year students said something similar.
I don't know how to square this with the data suggesting that Gen Z hates AI. Among my own kids, only the most traditionally academic one has a pragmatic, curious mind on the topic of AI. The other two, who spend their time on the arts, are like much of their generation: mad as hell about AI.
But something is happening here. These 15 students would not have taken gap years a decade ago, and certainly nine of them wouldn't be starting companies.
The bottom line: Nothing is overrated like a "college is overrated" hot take from a (rich) adult. But when the kids start saying the same thing, something is going on.
Kieran
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