When people think of high school dropouts, they do not generally associate them with great success. They are heavily looked down upon in society. This is mainly for good reason, considering the statistics. If people with a college degree make 65% more money than people with just a high school degree, imagine the disparity between those with a college degree and those without a high school degree. However, some high school dropouts do make it far in life.
One such person is Australia-born Ben Pasternak, previous owner of Nuggs. At fifteen years old, Pasternak dropped out of his school. With a large interest in programming, Pasternak harnessed his skills and turned them into success without the help of school. By the time he had turned eighteen years old, Pasternak had build and sold a video-chat app called Monkey. It had 10 million users at the time.
Pasternak’s next business venture, Nuggs, has become even more successful, raising over fifteen million dollars from Lerer Hippeau, Alexis Ohanian and McCain Foods. Nuggs is a plant-based nugget brand that is vegan-friendly. Though Pasternak is no longer the CEO of Nuggs, he continues to serve on the board as a Chairman.
Great job on this! He definitely went against the grain with dropping out of high school, but he also had something many high school dropouts lack and that’s a vision and a plan for their future. He had big aspirations and goals for his life which fortunately has led to great success.
I really enjoyed reading your post about Ben Pasternak and his story after dropping out of high school. Obviously, most people who drop out of high school are not as looked upon as you stated, but he took this challenge and executed in ways people would have never guessed. The NUGGS were definitely a big part of his success considering the amount of money he raised. I thought it was interesting that he is no longer the CEO of NUGGS but now a member on the board as a chairman. Overall, very interesting post, and I liked the success gained off of this. Good Job!