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Harvard Professor Advocates For A Gap Year

Would you believe us if we told you that an HBS professor is advocating for students to consider taking a gap year before starting college?

Dennis DiDonna, Senior Lecturer in Entrepreneurship at Harvard Business School, is doing just that. He has a long history with HBS, graduating with his MBA in 2010, and he’s been teaching at the school ever since.

DiDonna is a guru of all things sabbaticals. He primarily researches how these extended breaks from one’s regular life can transform one’s life, as well as have positive impacts for the company they are working within.

A GAP YEAR REDUCES STRESS

DiDonna has found three huge benefits for budding college students, the first of which is that taking a gap year can reduce stress.

This is critical especially for a generation in which 80% of college students reported feeling overwhelmed, and 40% said it was difficult to function.

DiDonna shared that in 2018 over one third of incoming freshmen suffered from mental health problems – and those were the stats before the pandemic.

A GAP YEAR INCREASES GRADES

The next benefit is that taking a gap year can have positive benefits on your grades. Back in 2015, the American Gap Association found that gap year alumni participants had higher GPAs – anywhere from 0.1 to 0.4 points – and shorter times to graduation compared to national norms.

Rest assured, parents. DiDonna says that studies show no actual difference in matriculation or graduation rates between gap-year-takers and their peers.

“It could be that a major based on intrinsic factors, like personal experience and discovered interest, has more staying power than one linked to extrinsic factors, like parental nudging,” he says.

A GAP YEAR HELPS ONE FIND PURPOSE

This finding leads us to our final of the three benefits – a gap can lead future students to discover their true purpose.

Last year, three-in-five young adults reported feeling like they were lacking “meaning or purpose,” in life.

DiDonna shares a quote from respected former Yale Professor William Deresiewicz’s book Excellent Sheep: “Our system of elite education manufactures young people who are smart and talented and driven, yes, but also anxious, timid, and lost, with little intellectual curiosity and a stunted sense of purpose … great at what they’re doing but with no idea why they’re doing it.”

“He believes a year off may be the best way for college-bound seniors stray from the herd,” adds DiDonna.

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