Joe Rogan has achieved remarkable success in various career fields, including as a UFC commentator, stand-up comedian, and the host of the Joe Rogan Experience podcast. Clearly, he possesses a high level of intelligence and education, but did he attend college?
Joe Rogan attended the University of Massachusetts – Boston but did not graduate, as he dropped out after three years. Before college, he attended Newton South High School and briefly enrolled at MassBay Community College for one semester.
He decided to leave college, explaining, “I went to college but I fooled off. I barely paid attention. All I was thinking about was martial arts competition and stand-up.”
As a college dropout, Rogan is an advocate for following one’s dreams and passions. He believes in hard work and embracing tough challenges, and not wasting your time doing things you don’t love doing, although still acknowledging that there are times of personal sacrifice.
Also see: Is Joe Rogan a Republican or Democrat?
Rogan Went to High School in Massachusetts
Before Rogan went to college, he attended Newton South High School and graduated in 1985. Interestingly, other notable alumni are John Krasinski and B.J. Novak, stars from the hit sitcom The Office, and are both are from the class of ’97.
What Did Joe Rogan Study in College?
After listening to a large amount of episodes of the JRE podcast it remains unclear if Rogan had an official major, although he has mentioned taking general education courses like science and turning in written papers. A quick dive into a Reddit post, and it appears the internet doesn’t know either, suggesting that he studied in “bro science.”
Rogan chose UMass Boston because he said that he never took an SAT test and this particular college had a program that you could enroll in without an SAT score.
“I only went back to school because I didn’t want people thinking I was a loser.”
Joe Rogan
Also see: Is Joe Rogan religious? His Beliefs on God Simplified
Why Did Rogan Drop Out of College?
A single written letter was the turning point to the decision of Joe Rogan dropping out of college. He described on JRE #941 with Greg Fitzsimmons that with his grades in question, he was asked to write a letter explaining his reasoning for having low grades that needed to convince the faculty in order to stay enrolled.
Rogan realized that he spent way more effort in writing the letter than he ever did in real classwork and homework, and that if he applied himself like this in the real world then he didn’t need college anymore.
The main takeaways about Rogan’s experience in college are:
- He did not pay attention in school or class
- He spent his time thinking about kickboxing and stand-up comedy
- He decided to quit and drop out of school before getting a degree
On JRE episode #1281 with guest Tom Papa, Joe said, “Once I realized people made money doing stand-up, that’s when I quit (school).”
Also see: Who Does Joe Rogan Hunt With?
Does Rogan Think People Should Go College?
Rogan is strongly against going to college just for the sake of doing it, especially if you’re doing it because you care about what other people think.
Rogan made this mistake himself, saying “I just didn’t want people to think I was a loser.” He was going to college because other people in his town were going and socially it seemed that if you weren’t going to college then you weren’t making something out of your life.
Once he realized what he was doing and realized that he could make a career doing something he loved, he immediately dropped out. Instead of finishing college, he pursued his dreams and got a real-life education. He started doing stand-up comedy and teaching taekwondo.
Perhaps, the life lessons he learned from stand-up comedy are worth more than taking a public speaking class or even getting a college degree in communication.
Joe Rogan on College Tuition and College Debt
“It’s a weird business, man. I don’t know why it costs so much.” – Joe Rogan
“One of the things I hate is talking to my friends about college debt. Friends in their 30s, 40s. It just stays with them like a wet blanket that you can never get out of.” – Joe Rogan
“One of the worst ways to prepare a kid for the future is to saddle them down with a quarter million dollars worth of debt by the time they graduate from college.” – Joe Rogan
Joe makes great point here, in that college is expensive and getting into massive debt is a huge hinderance for a young person starting out.
There are many occupations that require a college degree, which might be worth it. But, a lot of times the degrees that people come out of college with don’t pay very much and the graduates don’t even use them.
Go to college but really try to educate yourself, learn, maximize, and pick something that you actually love doing and is going to be useful for your future.
Check out this student loan clock, which was shown on JRE episode #1226 – Mike Baker, that displays the current student debt in United States.
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