The 21 Best Alternatives to College for Every Kind of Person
Not sure that college is the right path for you? Learn about the 21 best alternatives to college for 2021 and beyond.
Dropping Out of College: A Guide to Landing on Your Feet
So you’ve gone to college, you’re putting in all the effort, but something doesn’t feel right. Maybe it’s your courses, the institution, the dawning realization that all this debt might not be worth it in the long run, or a combination of all three. Maybe it’s something else altogether. Whatever the reason, the thought of…
7 Gap Year Programs to Try Out in 2020
Once you’ve talked your decision over with your family and settled on taking a year away from school, where can you start? Thankfully, there are many programs that you can complete while taking a gap year. Want to get work experience? There’s a program for that! Want to travel? Build wilderness skills? Volunteer? If you’re…
Homeschooled and Ready for College? Here’s a Better Higher Ed Strategy
You’re a homeschooler. You’ve just graduated, or are getting close to it, and after you finish high school you’re planning on going to college. But why? Haven’t you spent your whole education avoiding the traditional route? Why come all this way just to jump on the conveyor belt right at the most critical part of…
5 Foundations for Success as a College Opt-Out
Why would an academically-inclined student opt out of college? Most of the world expected I’d be college-bound. I thought I was too. But the more I thought about my future, the more I realized that college really didn’t make sense. I didn’t want to start my adult life by incurring debt. Going from a self-directed…
Why Customer Success is the Ultimate Launchpad for Your Career
What is Customer Success? “Sales generates customers, but customer service keeps them.” — Drake Powell Customer Success is one of the most important parts of a business. It’s the support the company offers to users (and sometimes potential users) of its product/service, and it’s the place where a customer’s technical problems and creative challenges get…
What Do They Really Want? How Millennials are Shifting the Focus on Higher Education
There’s no question that college students are unhappy with the status quo. Just Google “college memes.” You’ll see what I mean. You get results like this: Or this: Or this: Don’t tell me college-age kids aren’t sick of the status quo. 10 years ago, it would have been crazy to suggest that one day, “college…
Don’t Go to College for the Social Experience (How to Network Without College)
What do you think of when someone says the word “college”? Often the first picture that comes to mind is a college lecture hall. Add a professor, 2 students that actually care, and a whole lot of others that are only there because their parents paid for the class. That’s one picture of what college…
How to Plan a Gap Year
A gap year can be an incredible experience for any young person who wants to get experience outside traditional school. But without a roadmap, it can be easy to let an entire year slip past without gaining any real value from the time you take away from school. “Take advantage of the under-appreciated resource that…
College Alternatives: 2020’s Top Examples
College alternatives are rapidly expanding. Praxis is not the only option for today’s opt-outs! The entire education landscape is changing. College is dead, information is advancing faster than ever, and many individuals are realizing that the traditional path is not always the best path. While society chooses to focus on education reform from within, the…
Following Your Dreams, Dropping Out of School, & Doing Creative Work
Here are some of the assertions I defend on my recent appearance on The Ground Up Show: College isn’t for everyone. You don’t need to become the next Steve Jobs in order to justify your decision to opt-out of school. College degrees have been useful in the past because they served the function of signaling…
What We’ve Learned in the First 6 Years of Praxis
After contemplating and discussing with the Praxis team, I jotted down some of the big things we’ve learned now that we’re five years in to this great adventure: Our customers are heroes. I can’t emphasize this enough. Few appreciate just how awesome the young people we get to work with are. They are courageous enough…
Do You Have What it Takes to Opt-Out of College?
There’s a popular idea that the only people good enough to succeed without college are Steve Jobs level geniuses. This video makes that case that you’re not good enough to opt-out by presenting various statistics and averages of aggregates. I pointed out a few of the logical fallacies in that kind of argument here. The…
How to Get an Awesome Job With No Degree and Huge Gaps in Your Resume
In December of 2016, I decided that I’d like to join the team of a high growth startup 3 years after dropping out of college to work on unconventional projects and boats in the Carribean. In January 2017, I started as an intern at Praxis and by April was working full-time in the marketing department.…
5-on-5: Becoming a Successful Dropout
We asked five Praxis participants to give their answers to five questions on a single theme. This edition’s topic will focus on the rewards, challenges, and lessons that come with dropping out of college. 1) Why did you opt out of college? Simon Fraser, Placement Advisor: I quit college halfway through my sophomore year. I…