Thank you, this helps me a lot.
Paul Graham: News from the Front
121–128 of 128 posts
Re: Paul Graham: News from the Front
#122I think Paul's logic here is subtly backwards...
"It doesn't matter much where a given individual went to college."
From Y-Combinator's perspective, yes, I'm sure that's true. The people they're looking at are self-selected, and pretty much guaranteed to be smart, motivated and well-educated, which means that all Y-Combinator needs to do is worry about how they think - not where they were taught. But that's after the fact. To someone deciding what college to go to, or where to send their children, I think the choice is still very important.
"someone with a real thirst for knowledge will be able to find a few smart people to learn from at a school that isn't prestigious at all." True, of course. But where does that thirst for knowledge come from? With the right support, or the right teachers, perhaps that party animal would have changed his ways. As far as I'm concerned, _that_ is really the purpose of good schools.
In Y-Combinator terms, it's not that they make a founder more likely to succeed: it's that they make him more likely to try being a founder in the first place.
Re: Paul Graham: News from the Front
#123PG: have you noticed that a) GPA matters (at any school); b) that GPA matters at so-called elite schools in particular; c) any other consistencies with regards to college activities and/or honors, e.g. Phi Beta Kappa, having had started clubs or groups, etc.?
I don't know. We don't ask people what their grades were or what honors they got.
Re: Paul Graham: News from the Front
#124Peter Norvig in his essay "Teach Yourself Programming in Ten Years" says, "If you want, put in four years at a college (or more at a graduate school). This will give you access to some jobs that require credentials, and it will give you a deeper understanding of the field, but if you don't enjoy school, you can (with some dedication) get similar experience on the job. In any case, book learning alone won't be enough.…
Isn't it ironic that Peter Norvig touts this view, but works at google? I've heard that GPA/pedigree are one of the key decisions for hiring?
Maybe not all Google employees agree with what their HR dept/management does ?
Re: Paul Graham: News from the Front
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
In response to your first paragraph, I think more people should obsess about where there kids go to kindergarten. Not obsess about how a selective kindergarten will help them get into the right college, but about whether the environment will suppress creativity, being a self-starter, and intellectual curiosity, as most schools do. Unfortunately, schools that nurture those qualities usually cost money.
One of my biggest motivations for getting rich is so that when I have kids, I can afford to home-school them.
i disagree with home-schooling. kids need social interaction, they will get more creative, they will learn faster, and more importantly be more open to new ideas. putting your kids in a walled garden is going to harm them a lot
Re: Paul Graham: News from the Front
#126Earlier quoted context omitted.
One of my biggest motivations for getting rich is so that when I have kids, I can afford to home-school them.
i disagree with home-schooling. kids need social interaction, they will get more creative, they will learn faster, and more importantly be more open to new ideas. putting your kids in a walled garden is going to harm them a lot
Walk down the halls of your local middle school and tell me what behavior you see which you think your kids ought to emulate.
Whenever I meet someone who was home-schooled (or occasionally alternatively schooled) I can often guess that they were after a few minutes of conversation. There's a certain kind of confidence and maturity in them that doesn't survive public schools and never comes back afterward. I envy it.
Re: Paul Graham: News from the Front
#127PG: have you noticed that a) GPA matters (at any school); b) that GPA matters at so-called elite schools in particular; c) any other consistencies with regards to college activities and/or honors, e.g. Phi Beta Kappa, having had started clubs or groups, etc.?
I don't know. We don't ask people what their grades were or what honors they got.
Why not? I'm not implying that grades & honors definitely correlate in any way with whatever it is you are looking for in applicants, but they could.
Additionally, it may be the case that overall you have noticed that attending an elite school has no correlation with success in your program, but that doesn't mean an identifiable subset of elite school candidates do not as well. For example, suppose GPA doesn't correlate by itself, or even a high GPA at an elite school. Yet maybe a super-higher GPA at an elite school does, or Phi Beta Kappa or whatever.
Re: Paul Graham: News from the Front
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
One of my biggest motivations for getting rich is so that when I have kids, I can afford to home-school them.
i disagree with home-schooling. kids need social interaction, they will get more creative, they will learn faster, and more importantly be more open to new ideas. putting your kids in a walled garden is going to harm them a lot
Homeschooling doesn't have to mean preventing your kid from socializing with other kids. Most zip codes have a large enough home schooling community to provide plenty of similarly, and for that matter, differently, aged kids to interact with.