--- title: Why Students Are Choosing Startups Over College | daily.dev description: Young founders, particularly 19-21 year olds, are increasingly dropping out of college to start AI companies, driven by fear of missing the current AI boom.... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/why-students-are-choosing-startups-over-college-dzpvzdlci twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Why Students Are Choosing Startups Over College | daily.dev og:description: Young founders, particularly 19-21 year olds, are increasingly dropping out of college to start AI companies, driven by fear of missing the current AI boom.... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/why-students-are-choosing-startups-over-college-dzpvzdlci og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/DZPVzdLci.png og:image:alt: Why Students Are Choosing Startups Over College og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Why Students Are Choosing Startups Over College **[No Priors: AI, Machine Learning, Tech, & Startups](https://daily.dev/sources/nopriorspodcast)** · 1 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary Young founders, particularly 19-21 year olds, are increasingly dropping out of college to start AI companies, driven by fear of missing the current AI boom. The rapid week-to-week pace of AI development favors younger, agile founders who can move quickly. Credit is given to Sam Altman and Greg Brockman for betting on transformer architectures and demonstrating scalability, which laid the groundwork for today's startup wave. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [AI-native startups hire fewer juniors, Harvard finds](https://daily.dev/posts/ai-native-startups-hire-fewer-juniors-harvard-finds-uyf2t8vds) · The Next Web · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Altman says four years of college may be more than the world now needs](https://daily.dev/posts/altman-says-four-years-of-college-may-be-more-than-the-world-now-needs-shszvkvjk) · The Next Web · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Build in public, fail in public: what it’s like to be a founder under 20 right now](https://daily.dev/posts/build-in-public-fail-in-public-what-it-s-like-to-be-a-founder-under-20-right-now-xpfrlm2ld) · TechCrunch · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/why-students-are-choosing-startups-over-college-dzpvzdlci) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Why Students Are Choosing Startups Over College","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/why-students-are-choosing-startups-over-college-dzpvzdlci","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/why-students-are-choosing-startups-over-college-dzpvzdlci"},"datePublished":"2026-03-12T16:21:53.898Z","dateModified":"2026-03-12T16:22:08.391Z","description":"Young founders, particularly 19-21 year olds, are increasingly dropping out of college to start AI companies, driven by fear of missing the current AI boom....","image":"https://i.ytimg.com/vi/fEorh52vWQI/sddefault.jpg","thumbnailUrl":"https://i.ytimg.com/vi/fEorh52vWQI/sddefault.jpg","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"No Priors: AI, Machine Learning, Tech, & Startups","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"No Priors: AI, Machine Learning, Tech, & Startups","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--Hj2kMkm_--/f_auto,q_auto/v1772391934/logos/nopriorspodcast","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/nopriorspodcast"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/why-students-are-choosing-startups-over-college-dzpvzdlci","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":0},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"","timeRequired":"PT1M","video":{"@type":"VideoObject","name":"Why Students Are Choosing Startups Over College","description":"Young founders, particularly 19-21 year olds, are increasingly dropping out of college to start AI companies, driven by fear of missing the current AI boom....","thumbnailUrl":"https://i.ytimg.com/vi/fEorh52vWQI/sddefault.jpg","uploadDate":"2026-03-12T16:21:53.898Z","duration":"PT1M","url":"https://api.daily.dev/r/DZPVzdLci","embedUrl":"https://www.youtube.com/embed/fEorh52vWQI"}} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"No Priors: AI, Machine Learning, Tech, & Startups","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/nopriorspodcast"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Why Students Are Choosing Startups Over College"}]} ```