Jihad Kawas started his company, Saily, when he was 16 years old growing up in Lebanon. Now, two years later, after a recent public launch, his app has over 140,000 U.S. users and is gaining over 1,000 new users daily. Jihad is a 2015 Thiel Fellow who never attended college. Along the way, he was awarded a Forbes 30 Under 30 Scholarship, took first place at an MIT Social Innovation Camp, and has been a TEDx Talk speaker.

This week, in a special edition of Curious Minds, I share interviews with four young people, ages 18-22, each of whom decided either to drop out or never attend college, in order to pursue work that mattered. Each is either a current or past recipient of a Thiel Fellowship, a program founded in 2011 by Peter Thiel to encourage young people to sidestep college and a traditional life path, in order to chart their own course as entrepreneurs.

In this episode you will learn:

how building things as a young person led him to where he is today

why parents need to let their children build real, meaningful things

his beliefs regarding the impact of parents, families, and schools on young people

ways even cutting-edge schools have rules and policies that constrain

how he viewed school as something to get through in order to pursue his passion

the power of having to develop a pitch to persuade and convince

the funny way he found out about the Thiel Fellows program

what it is like to be an 18-year-old Thiel Fellow and company founder

how the success and accomplishments of his peers spur him on

how he spends his time

about the constant battle he faces with uncertainty and doubt

about his advice for young people

what he is curious about today

Episode Links

Project-based Learning

Apple Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC)

TEDx Talk by Jihad Kawas

Silicon Valley TV show

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