By Michelle Karim and Patricia Soberano
Only 44% of jobs in the New York City tech industry require a Bachelor’s degree, a recent statistical report released by HR&A advisors, an economic growth advising company for vast communities stated.
The only foreseeable setback of not graduating college may be the re-entry in the academic system, Slater Victoroff, Indico’s CEO and co-founder said. Indico, a data analysis and programming company was founded by Victoroff and three colleagues almost two years ago in Massachusetts. Only one of the founders graduated from college.
“I’m very happy having not finished school,” Victoroff, who wished to become a lawyer, said.“I think that despite the fact that I hadn’t finished, the amount that I got out of my education was still incredible. I spent three years there and I think the amount I would get out of the fourth year is not worth a year of my time,” he said.
Columbia University launched a Columbia Startup Lab last year to support growing startups and encourage them to take advantage of interdisciplinary collaboration.
“In the six years I’ve been involved in this program, only two students have dropped out,” Christopher McGarry, the Director for Entrepreneurship and Columbia Alumni Relations and Development for Columbia University said.
McGarry also supports the idea of graduating college because of the networking opportunities provided by different university programs in varying fields and the ability to bounce off ideas in an intellectually safe environment.
According to the National Center for Education Statistics’ data, the college dropout rate decreased from 12 percent in 1990 to 7 percent in 2013. HR&A Advisors also reported that 11,600 jobs in the tech industry do not require a bachelor’s degree.
“As Indico started and the more I started working, my grades significantly dropped.,” Diana Yuan, COO and co-founder of Indico, said.
“Obviously because I spent my time not at school but working on our company which has more significant value,” she added. Diana Yuan graduated from Babson College this year, with a B.S. with a concentration in Technology, Entrepreneurship, and Design.
In 2015, Stony Brook University’s Long Island High Technology Incubator has launched more than 70 companies with an economic activity of $2.5 billion dollars, according to Accelerate Long Island status report.
To be successful, one must have the vision for a need of a particular innovation in the society, Dr. Gerrit Wolf, an industrial and organizational psychologist and Director of the Innovation Center at Stony Brook University said. Wolf has focused 20 years of his career on entrepreneurship.
“A student who has more experience in the real world is more likely to discover needs out there,” he said.
MICHELLE KARIM 
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