4 ms·

I recall seeing a spreadsheet of ycombinator graduates (sorry, can't seem to find it now - will link it when I do) and noticed that a significantly large percen

I recall seeing a spreadsheet of ycombinator graduates (sorry, can't seem to find it now - will link it when I do) and noticed that a significantly large percentage of its founders were ivy league/1st-tier school graduates. I bring up this point because you seem to think age is a factor that brings you down... but the statistics would have it that even a candidate in his mid-20s from a non-prominent school could not get accepted to yc.

wheels 15y ago
It's a large percentage, but probably less than half (at least in our batch). Also most weren't fresh grads. It seemed like the median age was 25 or so. Most had had jobs post-college. So, basically a mid-20s candidate from a non-prominent school is closer to the median than a fresh Ivy League grad. I was 29 and my co-founder 34 when we went through; we both went to good, but non-elite universities and I didn't ever feel out of place. Note that Paul and Robert were 31 and 30 [1][2] respectively when they founded Viaweb and Paul has written on how elite universities are a bad predictor of success [3], so it's unlikely that what's being seen is causation rather than correlation. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Graham_(computer_programmer) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Graham_(computer_programme... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Tappan_Morris http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Tappan_Morris [3] http://www.paulgraham.com/colleges.html http://www.paulgraham.com/colleges.html
nl 15y ago
By "graduates" do you mean "people who have just graduated"? This was the case early on (when YCombinator was marketed using the whole "drop out of college and do a startup meme). I believe they have stated that the age distribution is much wider now. Having said that, it's probably easier to live on the YCombinator investment if you are young don't have kids than if you do.

wheels 15y ago

It's a large percentage, but probably less than half (at least in our batch). Also most weren't fresh grads. It seemed like the median age was 25 or so. Most had had jobs post-college. So, basically a mid-20s candidate from a non-prominent school is closer to the median than a fresh Ivy League grad. I was 29 and my co-founder 34 when we went through; we both went to good, but non-elite universities and I didn't ever feel out of place. Note that Paul and Robert were 31 and 30 [1][2] respectively when they founded Viaweb and Paul has written on how elite universities are a bad predictor of success [3], so it's unlikely that what's being seen is causation rather than correlation. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Graham_(computer_programmer) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Graham_(computer_programme... [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Tappan_Morris http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Tappan_Morris [3] http://www.paulgraham.com/colleges.html http://www.paulgraham.com/colleges.html

nl 15y ago

By "graduates" do you mean "people who have just graduated"? This was the case early on (when YCombinator was marketed using the whole "drop out of college and do a startup meme). I believe they have stated that the age distribution is much wider now. Having said that, it's probably easier to live on the YCombinator investment if you are young don't have kids than if you do.