Dropouts

/ˈdrɑːpaʊts/ noun

Definition

People who stop attending school or leave an activity before finishing it.

Etymology

From 'drop out' (drop + out), combining Old Norse 'dropa' (to fall) with Old English 'ūt' (out). Originally used in the 1960s to describe students leaving school, later generalized to anyone abandoning a pursuit.

Kelly Says

The term exploded in popularity during the 1960s counterculture when thousands of students deliberately left college—but famously, some of history's most successful people like Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg were 'dropouts' who still changed the world.

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