News & Press
How To Have A Successful Gap Year — Tips For Malia Obama And Other High School Grads
2016-05-03
By Anya Kamenetz Imagine your bright young son or daughter comes to you, high school mortarboard in hand, and says, “Mom, Dad, I’m not going to college next year.” What’s your reaction? If you’re the commander in chief or first lady, the answer is, reportedly, supportive. Their older daughter, Malia Obama, made headlines this week...
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Why more teens like Malia Obama are taking a gap year
2016-05-03
President Barack Obama’s eldest daughter Malia announced plans to take a gap year before she attends Harvard in 2017, an idea that is taking hold among more and more students. In 2015, 30-40,000 students took a year off after graduating high school, a 20 percent jump. William Brangham talks to Joe O’Shea of Florida State...
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Malia’s decision to take a gap year isn’t just good for her — it’s good for the country, entrepreneur says
2016-05-03
By Abigail Falik When the White House announced Sunday that Malia Obama would attend Harvard University but take a year off first, it sparked a lot of conversation about “gap years.” Abigail Falik, founder and chief executive officer of Global Citizen Year and an award-winning entrepreneur, writes her views on the benefits of taking an exploratory...
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Malia Obama’s ‘Gap Year’ Is Part of a Growing (and Expensive) Trend
2016-05-03
By Mike McPhate It sounds awfully nice: A yearlong postponement of schoolwork. The White House announced on Sunday that Malia Obama, the president’s older daughter, would be among the thousands of students to take a so-called gap year between high school and college. The hiatus from classrooms, textbooks and tests has become an increasingly popular...
Read More Why more high-school seniors need to be like Malia Obama and take a gap year
2016-05-03
By Jeffrey J. Selingo Sunday’s announcement from the White House that Malia Obama would take a gap year before starting at Harvard University in the fall of 2017 drew swift reactions on social media—a mix of support, ridicule for delaying adulthood, and some envy that the idea of taking a break before college is...
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Why a gap year is increasingly popular for many would-be freshmen and their parents
2016-04-28
The deadline is looming this week for local high school students to decide where to go to college. But more and more kids are deciding to take the year off instead. And for many, that’s increasingly proving to be an enticing alternative. KIRO Radio’s Josh Kerns introduces us to one such student who found a...
Read More Don’t Send Your Kids to College. At Least Not Yet.
2016-04-08
This op-ed was originally published in The New York Times with Nicholas Kristof on April 5th, 2016. View the original publication of the article at this link. In the past few weeks, anxious high school seniors across the country have received admissions decisions from colleges. Some might feel like they’ve won the lottery; others have dashed hopes...
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‘Gap years’ offer teens service, travel — and transformation
2015-12-27
By Sharon Noguchi For 13 years, Isabel Garcia, of Redwood City, hit the books and was poised to become the first in her immigrant family to go to college. Then instead she decided to spend a year in Brazil as an unpaid apprentice and was met with bewilderment. “You’re in America, it’s perfect here, why...
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Vision + Strategy
2015-12-01
Entrepreneur and educator Abby Falik is on a crusade to make a global bridge year post-high school the norm. Story by Amalia McGibbon // Portraits by Jack Hutcheson What is the point of college? It’s a genuine question. With a third of American freshman dropping out before their second year, student debt on the rise,...
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