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26-482: The Thiel Fellowship (originally named 20 under 20 ) is a fellowship created by billionaire Peter Thiel through the Thiel Foundation . The fellowship is intended for students aged 22 or younger and offers them a total of $ 100,000 over two years, as well as guidance and other resources, to drop out of school and pursue other work, which could involve scientific research, creating a startup, or working on

52-462: A 4-point scale, and some historians say this is the origin of the standard modern American GPA scale. Bob Marlin argues that the concept of grading students' work quantitatively was developed by a tutor named William Farish and first implemented by the University of Cambridge in 1792. That assertion has been questioned by Christopher Stray, who finds the evidence for Farish as the inventor of

78-743: A close look at how the first batch of Thiel Fellows had fared, finding that some had succeeded and others planned to return to school in the fall once their two years were up. In September, academic Vivek Wadhwa wrote that the Thiel Fellowship had failed to produce any notable successes to date, and even its limited successes were instances where the Thiel Fellows were working in collaboration with more experienced individuals. Also in October, former Harvard University President Larry Summers said at The Nantucket Project conference: "I think

104-437: A correlation between GPA and future Job satisfaction . Studies have also shown that a higher GPA leads to a higher income. Students were given assessments as far back as 500 B.C. but no methods existed to formally measure student performance or track mastery of the subject. In the mid 1600’s Harvard University started to require exit exams to evaluate students, but they were not scored with letter grades. The first record of

130-489: A grading scale for students was at Yale University. Yale University historian George Wilson Pierson writes: "According to tradition the first grades issued at Yale (and possibly the first in the country) were given out in the year 1785, when President Ezra Stiles , after examining 58 Seniors, recorded in his diary that there were 'Twenty Optimi , sixteen second Optimi , twelve Inferiores ( Boni ), ten Pejores .'" By 1837, Yale had converted these adjectives into numbers on

156-446: A minimum grade point average or engaging in a certain activity (e.g., playing on a school sports team for athletic scholarship holders). Scholarships also range in generosity; some cover partial tuition , while others offer a 'full-ride', covering all tuition, accommodation, housing and others. Some prestigious, highly competitive scholarships are well-known even outside the academic community, such as Fulbright Scholarship and

182-588: A social movement. Selection for the fellowship is through a competitive annual process, with about 20–25 fellows selected annually. Peter Thiel announced the fellowship at TechCrunch Disrupt in September 2010. The first round of fellows, based on applications made at the end of 2010, was announced in May 2011. The second round of fellows, based on applications made at the end of 2011, was announced in June 2012. That year,

208-453: Is more interested in a topic, has learned to deal better with failure and whether he has developed new ideas cannot be answered with grades. Instead, Precht suggests a differentiated written assessment of the students' learning and development path. In his opinion, the grading system comes from a psychologically and pedagogically uninformed era and does not belong in the 21st century. German educational innovator Margret Rasfeld criticizes

234-447: Is solely based on their financial needs. The most common scholarships may be classified as: Grade point average Grading in education is the application of standardized measurements to evaluate different levels of student achievement in a course. Grades can be expressed as letters (usually A to F), as a range (for example, 1 to 6), percentages, or as numbers out of a possible total (often out of 100). The exact system that

260-469: Is used varies worldwide. In some countries, grades are averaged to create a grade point average ( GPA ). GPA is calculated by using the number of grade points a student earns in a given period of time. A GPA is often calculated for high school , undergraduate , and graduate students. A cumulative grade point average ( CGPA ), is the average of all the GPAs a student has achieved during their time at

286-632: The Rhodes Scholarships at the graduate level, and the Robertson , Morehead-Cain and Jefferson Scholarships at the undergraduate level. While the terms scholarship and grant are frequently used interchangeably, they are distinctly different. Where grants are offered based exclusively on financial need, scholarships may have a financial need component but rely on other criteria as well. A federal Pell Grant can be awarded to someone planning to receive their undergraduate degree and

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312-551: The Thiel Fellowship up until that point: "64 Thiel Fellows have started 67 for-profit ventures, raised $ 55.4 million in angel and venture funding, published two books, created 30 apps and 135 full-time jobs, and brought clean water and solar power to 6,000 Kenyans who needed it." In October 2023, the Washington Post reported that: "Eleven of the 271 recipients of the Thiel Fellowship have founded unicorns so far, an impressive accomplishment that doesn’t even take into account

338-501: The United States in 1971. It has been criticized that grades are only short-term snapshots of how much a student has learned in a given period of time, which only partially reflect the actual performance and does not take sufficient account of the individual development of students. Likewise, poor grades over a longer period of time would give students the impression that they would learn very little or nothing, which jeopardizes

364-489: The fellowship launched a website called "20 Under 20 Documentary Series" that features an online documentary series of four Thiel Fellowship recipients. The third class (announced in May 2013) included 22 fellows working on projects from garment manufacturing and B2B web products to ARM powered servers and biomedicine. The class included 7 fellows from outside of the US. In December 2013, a Wall Street Journal article summarized

390-404: The following people (year they were awarded the fellowship is indicated in parentheses): Scholarship Scholarship criteria usually reflect the values and goals of the donor of the award, and while scholarship recipients are not required to repay scholarships, the awards may require that the recipient continue to meet certain requirements during their period of support, such as maintaining

416-414: The innate intrinsic motivation of every child to learn. Children who have already lost their desire to learn and only study for their grades have no reason to continue learning after they have achieved the best possible grade. In addition, poor grades represent destructive feedback for students, since they do not provide any constructive assistance, but only absolute key figures. It is also criticized that

442-457: The inspiring innovations of other fellows and the many exciting projects yet to mature." Thiel's announcement of the Thiel Fellowship met with a diverse array of responses. Some, such as Jacob Weisberg , criticized Thiel's proposal for its utopianism and attack on the importance of education . Others, such as Vivek Wadhwa , expressed skepticism about whether the success or failure of the Thiel Fellowship would carry any broader lessons regarding

468-471: The institution. Students are sometimes required to maintain a certain GPA in order to be admitted to a certain academic program or to remain in that program. Grades are also used in decisions to provide a student with financial aid or a scholarship. Grades are seen as an indicator for academic success and ability, and GPA is thought to indicate future job effectiveness and success. In addition, research has shown

494-447: The numerical mark to be unpersuasive. Stray's article also explains the complex relationship between the mode of examination (oral or written) and the varying philosophies of education these modes imply to both the teacher and the student. The A-D/F system was first adopted by Mount Holyoke College in 1897. However, this system did not become widespread until the 1940s, and was still only used by 67% of primary and secondary schools in

520-402: The same evaluation standards". Grading may also reflect the bias of the instructor thereby reinforcing systematic bias. As educators have begun to recognize the potential drawbacks, alternative grading methods, including competency-based assessment, specifications grading, and "ungrading" have become more popular. Most nations have their own grading system, and different institutions in

546-458: The single most misdirected bit of philanthropy in this decade is Peter Thiel's special program to bribe people to drop out of college." A Thiel Fellow and a mentor for the Thiel Fellowship subsequently published an op-ed response in TechCrunch , restating the Thiel Fellowship's thesis and arguing that a four-year liberal arts education was becoming less relevant. Notable recipients include

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572-537: The system of grades as unhelpful and, in her opinion, the resulting competitive thinking in schools and says: "School is there to organize success and not to document failure." German neuroscientist Gerald Hüther criticizes grades for being responsible for ensuring that students cannot specialize in any topic that they are enthusiastic about and have a talent for, since otherwise their grades in other areas would deteriorate. He also believes that "our society will not develop further...if we force all children to conform to

598-489: The system of school grades in his book Anna, die Schule und der liebe Gott: Der Verrat des Bildungssystems an unseren Kindern . He believes that numbers from 1 to 6 (the school grading system used in Germany) do not do justice to the personalities of the children. In his opinion, grades are neither meaningful nor differentiated and therefore not helpful. For example, the questions whether a student has become more motivated,

624-491: The two-year term of the fellowship if they so desired. A year after the announcement of the first batch of Thiel Fellows, opinions on the program ranged from the skeptical and critical to the laudatory and optimistic. In 2012, Eric Markowitz offered a mixed review of the Thiel Fellowship in Inc. magazine. In 2013 the program attracted criticism for its limited results. In April, an article by Richard Nieva for PandoDaily took

650-507: The value of higher education or the wisdom of dropping out. In May 2011, shortly after the announcement of the first batch of Thiel Fellows, the admissions office at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) congratulated two MIT students for receiving the Thiel Fellowship. Both students would need to drop out of MIT to receive the fellowship, but would be able to return to MIT to resume their studies after completing

676-471: The way of thinking, which can often be traced back to the grading system, that bad grades lead to poor future prospects, leads to perplexity, pressure, stress and depression among parents and children. It is criticized that students often do not learn for their future life or out of interest in the material, but only for the grades and the associated status, which promotes bulimic learning . German philosopher and publicist Richard David Precht criticizes

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