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Ask HN: About To Finish High School, What Next?

9 points by bdean ↗ HN
Dear HNers,

I reach out to all of you for advise and general thoughts on my situation. I'm currently a senior in high school graduating in May. I have many passions, but the past two years has been more or less solidifing in my mind that I very much want to pursue technology, and business (surprise!). Before we begin let me tell you a bit about myself.

I grew up (still live in) a very technology "savvy" home. My father is a control systems engineer and always insistled technical knowlegde on both my brother (who works in the medical IT field) and I. I spent most of my time outside of school working on my local FIRST Robotics Competition team (Google it, its awesome). Last summer (Summer 2010) I was fortunate enough to use my experience from FIRST (plus having contacts) to land a programming internship at a logistics firm about a hour north of where I live. After the summer I'd proven myself valuable enough (mostly writing cucumber/selenium tests) to a small agile team that they hired me on part time while I work through school.

But over the last year I've grown a large itch toward starting my own company...and its tough to let go of it. I have some ideas I've tossed around, but I've never really had long periods of time to crank them out.

So at this point my natuaral progression from high school would be to move on and pursue a computer science degree. Although, due to financial, and academic issues moving into a four-year collage right out of high school isn't looking too bright.

So the question is whether I pursue going to a two year technical school with the plan on transfering to a four school for computer science? Or do I skip school for a year and pursue developing my ideas into potential companies?

9 comments

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shantanubala
I'm also in my senior year of high school, and I'll say this: don't skip on school. You'll have free time, and you can put that time into starting a company. But first, you have to just play around with stuff, and you'll always meet people in any school. Find people who share your passion, because they'll help you continue forward. And keep doing stuff like FIRST -- it's fun, but it also helps you tackle problems well. If you start building stuff for fun that seems like it'll make money, you've found an alternative to school. But unlimited free time sounds fun, but I guarantee you'll be getting the same amount of work done if you go to school and work on stuff in your free time. You may even produce better work because you won't "have the time" to procrastinate.

But it's all a matter of preference. I'm not really any wiser than you. But one question: does the idea of school sound appealing to you on its own?

fooandbarify
If you really have the itch, my vote is to take a year and go all-out entrepreneur. I'm on the far side of an electrical engineering degree and by the end of it an extra year one way or the other makes no difference, but the amount of experience to be gained from just one year of trying to run a business is invaluable. If school is a priority for you, set a benchmark for yourself so that you are not tempted to drag along a failing business for years instead of going to school.

If you don't have access to a good network of hackers (to be a part of your team and to go to for advice), ignore what I just said. Go to school - a CS degree is probably the best way for a young person to build up a network of programmers.

chromejs10
I agree with Shantanubala.

Once you put school off, it will get much harder to return to it. I know a lot of people who go "Oh i'll take time off and save up some money and go back in a year or two" but they never do. Also be careful going to non-four yr schools from the start. If you have the grades, it would be good to go to a state school (cheaper). Tons of people go to community colleges (or some other pre-college school) to save money, but end up getting stuck there because units wont transfer or they can't get their classes. They end up spending way more money. Might be better off to just be a student worker and take out some loans.

You read about kids dropping out of college to pursue their business ideas, but the majority of them fail. You'd be better off getting a dual degree in say CS and business. School will allow you to develop your ideas further and get the connections you need to get a job or start a business.

best of luck!

keiferski
Take a gap year and see what happens. If you succeed, awesome. Otherwise, go to school.

Going to college immediately after HS was probably one of the worst decisions I've ever made.

shantanubala
I think it really depends on the person. The main thing I'd say is that you don't have to drop out of school to start a company. There was a front page article just recently about Quizlet -- the founder was in school for 5 years before dropping out. I'd almost say that it's better to go to school, because it's the type of environment that allows you to find ideas and people easily in comparison to living on your own. Startups (and most ideas) seem to come out of life experiences rather than "Eureka moment" ideas (I don't remember the studies, but the science shows this). School gives you quite a lot of interesting experiences, even if it isn't always enjoyable.
maxharris
Going to college immediately after HS was probably one of the worst decisions I've ever made.

This was true for me, too! If you're not committed fully to the idea of more school, do not go. You won't be giving it your all, and your grades will show it. I tried to go to college and write software for my startup idea at the same time. This resulted in an academic disaster that I had to later work very hard to recover from.

Pursue your startup idea. If it works out, you're better off^ than if you had gone to college. If it bombs, you can pick yourself up and go to college, and you'll be a better, more focused student by this time!

^If you still want to go to college for some reason after a successful startup, you can. It's a hell of a lot easier to study anything when you don't have bills to pay. Just don't get into debt of any kind pursuing your startup. If this means living with your parents, so be it. You'll find out quickly enough is people want your thing enough to pay for it.

grizzlylazer
HS senior from hong kong here! recently graduated and heading to college in the bay area in september. i think it's a great idea to take a gap year to figure out what you want to do next. there is a lot you can do in one year. if you really have a great idea, the pursue it!
eswelsh
>So the question is whether I pursue going to a two year technical school with the plan on transfering to a four school for computer science? Or do I skip school for a year and pursue developing my ideas into potential companies?

Even if you don't finish college, I think you'll find that the experience will improve the quality of your ideas and your ability to execute them.