Palantir recently opened a paid internship for top high-school grads. The program has participants skip college entirely in favor of hands-on work and critical-thinking seminars.
On the surface, this looks like a bold skills-first move, and in many ways, it is. However, I don’t think this is really about ditching higher education. To me, it feels more like a response to what education (from pre-school through grad school) has been missing for decades: an actual practicum that prepares students for the workforce.
For years, employers have needed job-readiness, applied skills, and real-world experience alongside the traditional foundations that academia has focused on: theory, history, and (most importantly) critical thinking. In the real world, as practical skills have seemed to outweigh the value of theory, history, and critical thinking, those skills have started earning an eye roll at best. They’re often viewed as “nice to have” rather than essential.
This is where the tension shows up, but the real challenge is balance.
Theory, critical thinking, and an understanding of history are fundamental to the agility modern professionals need today and into the future. Practical skills are how we execute. Neither set of skills is more critical than the other.
Workplaces don’t just need people who can do the job on day one. They need people who can reason, question assumptions, adapt when the rules change, and understand context beyond the immediate task. That doesn’t come from practice alone—and it doesn’t come from theory alone either.
The real question isn’t whether higher (or formal) education matters. It’s whether education—formal or alternative—is evolving to balance practical skills with the deeper thinking that good work actually depends on.