Education. Education The most educated people are always self-taught

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Everyone knows that learning on your own is very difficult. It is much easier when you have teachers and mentors who will explain everything, help and support. But truly talented people are not afraid of difficulties. Therefore, history knows many examples of great self-taught people. On the next week birthday of just such a nugget - Ivan Petrovich Kulibin. He was born 280 years ago April 21, 1735. Let's think about him and other talented self-taught people and think about what we can learn from them.

Ivan Kulibin

The son of a Nizhny Novgorod tradesman Ivan Kulibin since childhood, he has been making some ingenious devices. At an older age, he became interested in the creation of watch mechanisms. His most famous work is a unique pocket watch, which contained a miniature musical apparatus and a tiny mechanical theater with movable figures. But with all this, he did not have a systematic education, he did not know much, so every time he had to "reinvent the wheel" from scratch.

The talented self-taught was invited to St. Petersburg, where he was in charge of a mechanical workshop at the Academy of Sciences, supervised the production of machine tools, astronomical and navigational instruments. He developed a project for a single-arch bridge across the Neva, figured out how to use mirrors to illuminate the dark passages of the Tsarskoye Selo Palace, invented a waterway - a vessel capable of going against the current using its own power. Unfortunately, not all of his inventions were put into practice.

I believe Kulibin was guided by the following principle in his life: "If something is missing in the world, it must be invented!"

Heinrich Schliemann

Heinrich Schliemann was born in the family of a poor rural pastor, from the age of 14 he worked as a merchant, then he was a cabin boy on a ship, and then a courier in Holland. The work did not prevent him from studying on his own foreign languages. He became fluent in Dutch, English, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese and Russian. He called his passion for learning languages ​​"painful" and wrote that he could speak 15 languages ​​fluently.

After that, he moved to Russia, got rich, then went to America. And at the age of 45, he suddenly decided to devote his life to archeology, moved to Greece and began searching for the legendary Troy. The excavated ancient city with many ancient treasures made Schliemann a world-famous amateur archaeologist.

What can we learn from his example? Don't be afraid to do what interests you. At the age of forty, to master the profession of an archaeologist - few will decide on this.

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky

Tsiolkovsky grew up as an ordinary active child: he loved to play with friends and go sledding in winter. After one of the walks, ten-year-old Kostya caught a cold and fell ill with scarlet fever, and as a result he partially lost his hearing. It became impossible to study at the gymnasium - he simply did not hear the teachers. As a result, he was expelled for poor performance. I had to study on my own.

However, Tsiolkovsky coped with this perfectly. He passed his teacher's exams and did his own scientific research. Although systematic education was sometimes lacking, isolation from the scientific environment also affected. For example, he wrote about kinetic theory gases, not knowing that it has been open for a quarter of a century.

But who knows, perhaps systemic education would have killed the dreamer in him, and fellow skeptics would not have let him even mentally go into space. Maybe it was thanks to his hearing loss that he became the founder of theoretical astronautics. He dreamed of iron birds - aircraft heavier than air, interplanetary travel and orbital stations. Unfortunately, it was not possible to realize all these ideas during the lifetime of the scientist. But later, many of his ideas found application in rocket science and astronautics. If there were no Tsiolkovsky, there would be no Korolev and Gagarin.

What can you learn from Tsiolkovsky? Perhaps his secret is that he believed in his dreams and did not give up in the face of difficulties.

Thomas Edison

BUT Edison at the time he said: "I was able to become an inventor because I didn't do well in school." He studied not only poorly, but not for long - only two months. He did not listen to the teacher at all, for which he constantly ridiculed and called the child names. It ended with the fact that Thomas's mother transferred him to home schooling. And, apparently, not in vain. At home, the child revealed his talents. He read a lot and constantly experimented. At first, of course, quite wild. They say that once a boy fed a neighbor's girl with worms. Not out of harm, of course. He simply believed that birds fly because they eat worms. So I decided to test this theory experimentally.

Probably if he was in school, the girl next door would avoid "worm diet". But Thomas's restlessness and his habit of dropping everything for the sake of an interesting idea eventually served humanity in good stead. During his life, he received more than 4,000 patents and gave the world a huge number of inventions.

What does Edison's story teach? If something doesn’t work out for you, don’t give up on yourself - it’s better to try changing your approach.

Coco Chanel

However, what are we talking about only men? There were also great self-taught women among women. A striking example is Coco Chanel. An orphan and a self-taught seamstress, she started by selling clothes in a shop and singing in a cabaret. She said: "No one taught me anything. I had to reach everything myself." But she had something that education does not give - a bold, fresh and unexpected look at things. She showed that beautiful clothes should not be uncomfortable. And such discoveries as her bag on a chain, a fitted jacket and a little black dress forever changed the world of fashion. Or maybe the world in general, by allowing women to be more daring in their choice of clothes. No wonder Chanel is called one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century.

The sciences feed young men,
They give joy to the old,
Decorate in a happy life
Save in case of an accident.

(M. V. Lomonosov)

An educated person is not just a person who has a diploma of completed education. This concept is many-sided and multifaceted, it consists of many criteria that are formed throughout the life of an individual.

History pages

What does an educated person mean? Surely many of us sooner or later asked this question. To answer it, we must turn to history. Namely, to those days when humanity began to make progress in the development of civilization.

Everything was created and done gradually. Nothing appears at once, at the wave of the mighty hand of the Creator. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was God." Communication, gestures, signs, sounds were born. It is from these times that the concept of education should be considered. People have got mutual language, the original knowledge base they passed on to children from generation to generation. Man made efforts to develop writing and speech. Drawing from these sources, the river of time has brought us to the present. There were many meanders in the channel of this river, incredible work was invested and colossal work was done. Yet this river brought us into the life we ​​see it now. Books have preserved and conveyed to us everything that man has created over the centuries. We draw knowledge from these sources and become educated people.

Educated person: concept, criteria, aspects

The interpretation of this term is ambiguous, researchers offer many definitions and variations. Some believe that an educated person is an individual who has completed educational institution and completed comprehensive training in a specific area of ​​​​knowledge. For example, these are doctors, teachers, professors, cooks, builders, archaeologists, managers and other specialists. Others argue that, in addition to state-commercial education, a person must also have social, life experience gained in travel, trips, in communication with people of different ethnic groups, classes and levels. However, such an interpretation is incomplete, since an educated person is a person of certain moral principles who has managed to achieve something in his life thanks to his knowledge, erudition, culture and determination. From all this, we conclude that an educated person is not only the most intelligent person, but also a person with a capital letter. Therefore, most researchers give a more accurate description of this term. They believe that an educated person is an individual who is offered by civilization itself. He has cultural and life experience, historically accumulated in the process of development and formation of culture, industry, industry, etc.

The image of an educated person is made up of many criteria and personality traits:

  • Having an education.
  • Language proficiency.
  • Culture of behavior.
  • Expanded horizons.
  • Erudition.
  • Wide vocabulary.
  • Erudition.
  • Sociability.
  • Thirst for knowledge.
  • Eloquence.
  • Mind flexibility.
  • The ability to analyze.
  • Striving for self-improvement.
  • Purposefulness.
  • Literacy.
  • upbringing.
  • Tolerance.

The role of education in human life

An educated person seeks knowledge for orientation in the world. It is not so important for him to know how many elements are in the periodic table, but he needs to have a general idea of ​​\u200b\u200bchemistry. In each area of ​​knowledge, such a person is guided easily and naturally, realizing that single accuracy is absolutely impossible in everything. This allows you to see the world from a different angle, navigate in space, makes life bright, rich and interesting. On the other hand, education acts as enlightenment for everyone, endowing with knowledge to be able to distinguish reality from imposed opinion. An educated person does not succumb to the influence of sectarians, advertising tricks, as he constantly analyzes what he has seen and heard, forming the only correct decision about the reality of what is happening. With the help of education, the individual achieves his goals, improves himself and expresses himself. Thanks to reading, an erudite person listens to his inner world, finds important answers, subtly feels the world, becomes wise, erudite.

The Importance of School Education

The first stage in the formation of each individual as an "educated person" is the initial educational institution, namely the school. There we get the basics of knowledge: we learn to read, write, draw, think in detail. And our future development, as a full-fledged representative of society, largely depends on how much we assimilate this initial information. From birth, parents develop a craving for knowledge in the child, explaining the importance of education in life. Thanks to the school, the abilities of each student are revealed, a love of reading is instilled, and the foundations are laid in society.

The school is the foundation for the formation of every educated person. It solves a number of important tasks.

  1. The primary education of a person, the transfer of social, life, scientific experience in significant areas, historically accumulated by civilization.
  2. Spiritual and moral education and personal development (patriotism, religious beliefs, family values, culture of behavior, understanding of art, etc.).
  3. Preservation and strengthening of health, both physical and mental, without which a person cannot fulfill himself.

Self-education and social, life experience is not enough to become educated, so the role of the school in the life of a modern individual is invaluable, irreplaceable.

The role of books in education

At present, teachers perceive the image of an intellectual as an ideal of an educated person, to which every student, student, and adult should strive. However, this quality is not a priority or mandatory.

How do we imagine an educated person

Each of us has our own on this topic. For some, an educated person is someone who has finished school. For others, these are people who have received a specialty in a particular field. Still others consider everyone educated smart people, scientists, researchers, those who read a lot and educate themselves. But education is the basis of all definitions. It radically changed life on Earth, gave a chance to fulfill oneself and prove to oneself that everything depends on a person. Education gives a chance to take a step into another world.

At each stage of personality formation, a person perceives the concept of education in different ways. Children and students are sure that this is just the smartest person who knows and reads a lot. Students look at this concept from the point of view of education, believing that after graduating from an educational institution, they will become educated people. The older generation perceives this image more broadly and thoughtfully, realizing that, in addition to learning, such a person must have his own store of knowledge, social experience, be erudite, well-read. As we can see, everyone has their own idea of ​​what an educated person should know.

Self-realization

When a person graduates from school, he experiences extraordinary joy, positive emotions, accepts congratulations and wishes to become a worthy person in the future. Having received a certificate, each graduate becomes a new life path to self-actualization and independence. Now to do important step- choose an educational institution and future profession. Many choose a difficult path to achieve their cherished dream. Perhaps this is the most important moment in a person's life - to choose professional activity according to the soul, interests, abilities and talents. On this depends the self-realization of the individual in society, his further happy life. After all, an educated person is, among other things, a person who has achieved success in one area or another.

The importance of education in our time

The concept of "education" includes the words - "to form", "to form", which means the formation of a person as a person. Forms it internally "I". Both in front of himself in the first place, and in front of the society in which he lives, is engaged in his field of activity, works and just spends his free time pleasantly. Undoubtedly, a good education in our time is simply irreplaceable. It is a worthy education that opens all the doors for the individual, makes it possible to get into " high society", get a first-class job with a decent salary and achieve universal recognition and respect. After all, there is never a lot of knowledge. With every day we live, we learn something new, we get a certain portion of information.

Unfortunately, in our twenty-first century, the age of digital technologies, communications and the Internet, such a thing as "education" is gradually fading into the background. On the one hand, it would seem that it should be the other way around. Internet, bottomless source useful information where everything is available. There is no need to once again run around libraries, fellow students in search of a missed lecture, etc. However, along with useful information, the Internet contains a huge amount of useless, unnecessary and even harmful information that clogs human brain, kills in him the opportunity to think adequately, leads a person astray. Often low-quality resources, useless social networks humanity is much more attracted than information from libraries useful for self-development.

What does ignorance lead to?

An uneducated person is under the delusion that he knows everything and has nothing more to learn. While an educated person will be sure until the end of his life that his education is not completed. He will always strive to know what will make his life even better. If a person does not strive for knowledge of the world and self-development, then in the end he comes to everyday life, a routine where work does not bring either pleasure or sufficient income. Of course, ignorance does not mean complete absence any knowledge or qualifications. A person can have several educations, but be illiterate. And vice versa, there are quite educated, well-read people who do not have a diploma, but have a high intellect, erudition due to independent study of the world around them, sciences, and society.

It is more difficult for uneducated people to fulfill themselves, to achieve what they want, to find something to their liking. Of course, remembering our grandparents, who at one time worked more than studied, we understand that it is possible to go through life without education. However, you will have to overcome a difficult road, work hard physically, spoiling both mental and physical health. Ignorance can be imagined as an isolated cube in which a person lives, not wanting to go beyond its boundaries. A raging life will boil and rush around, with magnificent colors, filled with vivid emotions, understanding, awareness of reality. And whether it is worth going beyond the edge of the cube in order to enjoy the true, fresh air of knowledge - only the person himself has to decide.

Summing up

An educated person is not only one who has finished school, an educational institution well and has a highly paid job in his specialty. This image is unusually multifaceted, includes a culture of behavior, intelligence, good breeding.

The main qualities of an educated person:

  • education;
  • literacy;
  • the ability to communicate and express one's thoughts correctly;
  • politeness;
  • purposefulness;
  • culture;
  • the ability to keep oneself in society;
  • erudition;
  • desire for self-realization and self-improvement;
  • the ability to subtly feel the world;
  • nobility;
  • generosity;
  • excerpt;
  • diligence;
  • sense of humor;
  • determination;
  • wit;
  • observation;
  • ingenuity;
  • decency.

The concept of "an educated person" is interpreted in different ways, but the main thing in all definitions is the presence of education received different ways: with the help of school, university, self-education, books, life experience. Thanks to knowledge, each of us can reach any heights, become a successful, self-fulfilling personality, a full-fledged unit of society, perceiving this world in a special way.

At present, it is difficult to do without education, because any field of activity requires certain skills and abilities. And to live in the world, knowing nothing about it, is like primitive man, absolutely meaningless.

Finally

In the article, we examined the main criteria, definitions of an educated person, answered the question of what it means to be a cultured person. Each of us regards and looks at things according to his social status and ability to perceive the world around him. Some do not even realize that it is bad for an intelligent person to say insulting things to the interlocutor. Some learned this truth from an early age. After all, the worldview of a person is primarily influenced by the education of people who put certain information into it, were guides to this life.

We also found out that a well-read person is an individual who reads not only special, educational literature, but also works of the classics. Much in this world is interconnected, but it is education that plays the main and decisive role. Therefore, it is worth taking it with all seriousness, desire and understanding. We are the masters of our lives. We are the creators of our own destiny. And how we live this life depends entirely on us. Despite the difficulties, political or military, our ancestors created excellent conditions for our life. And it is in our hands to make these conditions even better for our descendants. We need education in order to arrange our lives according to our own desire and become a happy person.

Raising the level of your education through the Internet is difficult. In order to become an erudite person, one must not forget to visit the library and read the books of an educated person. We bring to your attention popular publications that every educated person must read, this will make you an interesting, well-read, cultural interlocutor.

  1. Abulkhanova-Slavskaya K. A. Activity and psychology of personality.
  2. Afanasiev VG Society: consistency, knowledge and management.
  3. Brauner J. Psychology of knowledge.

Most of them do not have not only higher education but even average. It is noteworthy that this did not prevent them from making amazing discoveries and becoming the founders of completely new scientific disciplines.

Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky

Russian and Soviet self-taught scientist and inventor, school teacher. Founder of theoretical astronautics. He substantiated the use of rockets for flights into space, came to the conclusion that it was necessary to use "rocket trains" - prototypes of multi-stage rockets. His main scientific works relate to aeronautics, rocket dynamics and astronautics.
For unknown reasons, Konstantin never entered the school, but decided to continue his education on his own. Living literally in Moscow on bread and water (his father sent 10-15 rubles a month), he began to work hard. “Apart from water and black bread, I then had nothing. Every three days I went to the bakery and bought 9 kopecks worth of bread there. Thus, I lived 90 kopecks a month. To save money, Konstantin moved around Moscow only on foot. He spent all his free money on books, instruments and chemicals.
Every day from ten in the morning until three or four in the afternoon, the young man studies science in the Chertkovo public library - the only free library in Moscow at that time.
Work in the library was subject to a clear schedule. In the morning, Konstantin was engaged in exact and natural sciences, which required concentration and clarity of mind. Then he switched to simpler material: fiction and journalism. He actively studied "thick" journals, where both review scientific articles and journalistic articles were published.
For three years, Konstantin fully mastered the gymnasium program, as well as a significant part of the university one.

Srinivasa Ramanujan Iyengor

Having no special mathematical education, he received remarkable results in the field of number theory. Most significant is his work with Godfrey Hardy on the asymptotics of the number of partitions p(n).
At school, his outstanding abilities for mathematics showed up, and a student friend from the city of Madras gave him books on trigonometry. At the age of 14, Ramanujan discovered Euler's formula for sine and cosine and was very upset to learn that it had already been published. At the age of 16, the two-volume work of the mathematician George Shubridge Carr, "Collection of Elementary Results of Pure and Applied Mathematics", written almost a quarter of a century earlier, fell into his hands (later, thanks to the connection with the name of Ramanujan, this book was subjected to careful analysis). 6165 theorems and formulas were placed in it, practically without proofs and explanations. The young man, who had neither access to a university nor communication with mathematicians, plunged into communication with this set of formulas.
In 1913, the famous Cambridge University professor Godfrey Hardy received a letter from Ramanujan, in which Ramanujan reported that he did not graduate from the university, but after high school he studied mathematics on his own. Formulas were attached to the letter, the author asked to publish them if they were of interest, since he himself is poor and does not have sufficient funds for publication. A lively correspondence began between the Cambridge professor and the Indian clerk, as a result of which Hardy accumulated about 120 formulas, unknown to science. At the insistence of Hardy, at the age of 27, Ramanujan moved to Cambridge. There he was elected a member of the English Royal Society (English Academy of Sciences) and at the same time a professor at Cambridge University. He was the first Indian to receive such honors.

Milton Humason

Born in Minnesota, in the family of a major banker. At the age of 14 he left school and from 1917 began working at the Mount Wilson Observatory - first as a laborer, then as a night assistant. Despite his lack of special education at that moment, he showed extraordinary abilities as an observer, and by order of D. E. Hale was soon enrolled in the staff scientific works nicknames. He worked at the Mount Wilson Observatory until his retirement in 1957.
The main works in the field of spectral characteristics of stars and galaxies. In the initial period of his activity, together with W. S. Adams and A. H. Joy, he participated in the program for determining the absolute spectral magnitudes of 4179 stars; received a large number of photographs of nebulae and stellar regions. In 1928, he successfully continued the systematic spectral observations of faint galaxies begun at the Mount Wilson Observatory in order to determine their velocities. Developed a special technique for photographing the spectra of faint galaxies on a 100-inch, and then on a 200-inch reflector; in 1930-1957 he determined the radial velocities of 620 galaxies. Performed spectral observations a large number supernovae, former novae, and faint blue stars, including white dwarfs. In 1961, he discovered a comet (1961e), which was distinguished by high activity at large distances from the Sun.

Camille Flammarion

He did not receive higher education. From 1858 to 1862 he worked under the direction of Le Verrier as a calculator at the Paris Observatory, from 1862 to 1866 he worked at the Bureau of Longitudes, in 1876-1882 he was an employee of the Paris Observatory. He was the editor of the scientific department of the journals Cosmos, Siecle, Magasin pittoresque.
In addition to astronomy, Flammarion dealt with the problems of volcanology, earth's atmosphere, climatology. In the years 1867-1880 he made several ascents in balloons in order to study atmospheric phenomena, in particular atmospheric electricity.

Michael Faraday

Faraday never managed to get a systematic education, but early showed curiosity and a passion for reading. There were many scientific books in the store; in later memoirs, Faraday especially noted books on electricity and chemistry, and in the course of reading, he immediately began to conduct simple independent experiments. Father and older brother Robert, to the best of their ability, encouraged Michael's craving for knowledge, supported him financially and helped to make the simplest source of electricity - the Leyden Bank. The brother's support continued after the sudden death of his father in 1810.
An important stage in Faraday's life was his visits to the City Philosophical Society (1810-1811), where 19-year-old Michael listened to popular science lectures on physics and astronomy in the evenings and participated in disputes. Some scholars who visited the bookstore noted a capable young man; in 1812, one of the visitors, musician William Dens (William Dance), presented him with a ticket to a cycle of public lectures at the Royal Institute of the famous chemist and physicist, the discoverer of many chemical elements Humphrey Davy.
Discovered electromagnetic induction, which underlies the modern industrial production of electricity and many of its applications. Created the first model of the electric motor. Among his other discoveries are the first transformer, the chemical effect of current, the laws of electrolysis, the effect of a magnetic field on light, and diamagnetism. He was the first to predict electromagnetic waves. Faraday introduced the terms ion, cathode, anode, electrolyte, dielectric, diamagnetism, paramagnetism, and others into scientific use.

Walter Pitts

Walter Pitts was born in Detroit on April 23, 1923 to a dysfunctional family. He independently studied Latin and Greek languages, logic and mathematics in the library. At the age of 12, he read the book “Principia Mathematica” in 3 days and found several controversial points in it, about which he wrote to one of the authors of the three-volume book, Bertrand Russell. Russell responded to Pitts and suggested that he go to graduate school in the UK, however, Pitts was only 12 years old. After 3 years, he learned that Russell had come to lecture at the University of Chicago and ran away from home.
In 1940, Pitts meets Warren McCulloch and they begin to pursue McCulloch's idea of ​​neuron computerization. In 1943 they published "A logical calculus of ideas relating to nervous activity".
Pitts laid the foundations for the revolutionary idea of ​​the brain as a computer, which stimulated the development of cybernetics, theoretical neurophysiology, and computer science.

Vladimir Andreevich Nikonov

A self-taught scientist without higher education, one of the largest Soviet onomasts. Honorary Member of the International Committee of Onomastic Sciences at UNESCO (1972).
After the gymnasium, he did not study anywhere, being engaged exclusively in self-education. Nikonov, therefore, did not have a higher education, a certificate of secondary education and a certificate of completion of elementary school.
The main scientific interests in onomastics are Russian surnames, geographical names(toponyms), names of space objects (astronyms), animal names (zoonyms). More than 300 articles and notes by Nikonov have been published in various Soviet encyclopedias. He lectured at 18 universities of the USSR.

Boris Vasilievich Kukarkin

After graduating from school, he was engaged in self-education and at the age of 18 headed the observatory of the Nizhny Novgorod Society of Physics and Astronomy Lovers, having stayed in this post until 1931.
In 1928, he discovered a relationship between the period and spectral type of eclipsing variable stars.
In 1934, together with P. P. Parenago, he established a statistical relationship between the flare amplitude and the duration of the cycles between flares for U Gemini variables, which led to their prediction of the flare of the nova-like star T Northern Corona.
Conducted studies of light curves, periods and luminosities of Cepheids.

Viktor Stepanovich Grebennikov

Russian entomologist and apiologist, animal painter, specialist in breeding and protection of insects, writer. Honored ecologist of Russia, member of the International Association of Bee Scientists, as well as a member of the Social and Ecological Union and the Siberian Ecological Fund.
Self-taught, had no higher education.
In 1946, he was convicted of forging bread cards (he drew them "by hand"), and was released under an amnesty in 1953. Since 1976, he worked in Novosibirsk, at the Siberian Research Institute of Agriculture and Chemicalization of Agriculture. Created in the village of Krasnoobsk, Novosibirsk region, where he lived, several micro-reserves (reserves) for insects.
He devoted his entire life to the study of insects.
He died April 10, 2001 at the age of 73.

Israel Moiseevich Gelfand

The main works of Gelfand relate to functional analysis, algebra and topology. One of the creators of the theory of normed rings (Banach algebras), which served as the starting point for the theory of rings with involution created by him (together with M. A. Naimark) and the theory of infinite-dimensional unitary representations of Lie groups, which is essential for theoretical physics. Along with this, the author of fundamental results in the field of the theory of generalized functions, studied differential equations, the theory of topological linear spaces, inverse problems of spectral analysis, quantum mechanics, dynamical systems, probability theory, approximate and numerical methods and other areas of mathematics. Author of numerous works on the neurophysiology of volitional movements, cell migration in tissue cultures, proteomics (classification of the tertiary structure of proteins) and the algorithmization of the clinical work of doctors.
It is noteworthy that he is the founder of a large scientific school, although he himself did not even receive a secondary education.

The importance of education cannot be denied. It is believed that the more educated a person is, the more successful his future career will be. Many believe that people who drop out of university or school are choosing for themselves a long and painful career in a fast food restaurant. But there are always exceptions to the rule. Below is a list of 10 such people.

10. John D. Rockefeller.Billionaire.


Before becoming arguably the richest man in history (adjusted for inflation), John Rockefeller was the humble son of a slick swindler and high school student in suburban Cleveland, Ohio. Although he was a little educated, when he was sixteen, Rockefeller decided to drop out of school and start a career with the goal of earning $ 100,000.

We can safely say that he brought his dream to life, as well as many others. Rockefeller made his mark in the oil industry by founding the company "" and, ultimately, creating a monopoly on the entire industry. By 1902 he had $200 million, and before his death he had amassed a fortune of over one billion dollars. Study must have been important.

9. Horace Greeley.Journalist and congressman.

Unless you're a big fan of the history of journalism, you've probably never heard of Horace Greeley, except perhaps in a passing mention somewhere. Born in New Hampshire in the early nineteenth century, Greeley became one of the most powerful press figures in American history. He also became a congressman and one of the founding members of the Republican Party.

Greeley did it all without a high school education. At the age of fifteen, he left home to become an apprentice with a printer in Vermont. When he was twenty, he moved to New York and began working for The New Yorker and the New York Tribune. It was his work with the Tribune that made him famous. He also helped found the city that would later bear his name. To this day, he is considered one of the most influential journalists in history.

8. John Glenn Astronaut.

During the intense space race in the 1950s and 1960s, a man appeared who became the first American astronaut when the US was fighting with Soviet Union for the championship, first in space, and then on the moon. That man was John Glenn. He became a war hero and one of the most famous astronauts in history despite dropping out of university. Glenn attended Muskingum University where he studied science. But when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, he left it to fight in World War II.

7. Steve JobsApple co-founder.

In the late twentieth and early twenty-first century, there were a huge number of greats who did incredible things without even graduating from college, such as Bill Gates (Microsoft) and Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook). But perhaps the most influential "technological" mind of the last century was Steve Jobs, the co-founder of .

Jobs and Steve Wozniak created the first successful personal computers and introduced numerous revolutionary products such as the iPod, iPhone and iPad. Jobs did this after only six months at university.

By the way, Jobs was adopted. His biological mother only agreed to give him to Clara and Paul Jobs on the condition that he attend university. Well, mission accomplished.

6. Mark Twain.Writer and satirist.

Arguably America's most beloved writer and humorist, Mark Twain rose to prominence after creating the classic characters of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. His novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is considered by many to be "the great American novel". Not bad for a man who had an incomplete secondary education and worked as an apprentice from the age of eleven.

When Twain was eighteen, he worked as a printer in New York, Philadelphia and St. Louis, and spent all his evenings in the library. Before he became a steamship navigator, he supplemented his knowledge by reading everything that fell into his hands. Twain continued to work on the steamboat until civil war, and after a brief stint in the Confederate army, he began to travel throughout the country and write extensively. Twain is a clear proof that the mind is given from birth.

5. Henry Ford.Industrialist and entrepreneur.

In the history of America, perhaps, few people are the personification of a "successful self-taught person", more than a person who is remembered by mankind for the almost sole creation of the US automobile industry. Ford had an incomplete secondary education. He was born on a farm near Detroit, where he worked with a father who dreamed that his son would someday have his own farm.

Instead, at the age of seventeen, Ford left home and became an apprentice machinist in Detroit, thus choosing a career that would ultimately change his life, making him a very wealthy and successful industrialist. Despite the fact that he had almost no high school education, Ford created a mechanized assembly line, and this happened long before, thanks to his work, Detroit was called the "Motor City".

4. William Shakespeare.Poet and playwright.

Currently one of the most famous historical figures, William Shakespeare is one of the most famous historical figures. He created the world's favorite works that the world has ever known: Romeo and Juliet, Lady Macbeth, etc. But very little is known about Shakespeare's early life, in fact, there is not even a record left to show that he ever received a secondary education.

Scholars suggest that he attended the New King's School, but at the same time, according to some of his writings, he left school at the age of thirteen. It seems surprising that the person who gave English language more than 1700 words, apparently, left his studies in high school.

3. Winston Churchill.State and political figure.

One of the most prominent political figures of the 20th century, the famous satirist and master of aphorisms, Winston Churchill was born into a family of aristocrats. Therefore, it is not surprising that he quickly rose through the ranks and eventually led Britain to victory in World War II. What is really amazing, and why he is on this list, is that he reached such heights with an incomplete high school education.

Churchill, who came from a wealthy family, had the best education available. But, unfortunately, this did not mean that he was a good student. Studying was not easy for him and he studied quite poorly, and was often punished for poor academic performance. The military service also had problems due to poor performance. Three times he tried to enter the Royal Military School, and was only accepted after he applied to the cavalry class, and not to the infantry, as the requirements there were lower and knowledge of mathematics was not required. In fairness, it should be noted that no one likes mathematics.

2. Abraham Lincoln.President of the U.S.A.

Arguably the most popular US president ever, a man who, contrary to popular belief, didn't fight vampires, Abraham Lincoln was America's sixteenth president. He led the nation through perhaps the most difficult times. But the man who gave the Gettysburg Address and ended slavery in the US, though not with the Emancipation Proclamation, was not well educated.

Lincoln was almost completely self-taught, despite being notoriously lazy at an early age. This did not stop him from starting his career in politics from the very bottom in his early twenties. Lincoln became a member of the Bar after studying the law on his own in his spare time. It seems that he was a political prodigy. And if everything that is said about him is true, then he achieved everything thanks to reading by candlelight in his small wooden house.

1. Albert Einstein.Physicist.


Yes, the man whose name is now equated with the word "genius", who published more than 300 scientific papers; the person who created the theory of relativity (E = mc2) and the person who received Nobel Prize, was expelled in high school. He tried to enter the university, but failed the entrance exams.

Einstein eventually went to college and graduated, of course, precisely because people of his unsurpassed intellect will always find a way out. But the fact remains that the greatest mind of the twentieth century was dropped out of school.