Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg receives Harvard degree 12 years after dropping out

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg returns to Harvard to be given an honorary Doctor of Laws degree.
AP
Rashid Razaq26 May 2017

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg told Harvard graduates “one day we can connect the whole world” as he returned to the university where he dropped out from to receive an honorary degree.

“Change starts local. Even global changes start small - with people like us,” said the 33-year-old billionaire who has committed to giving away nearly all of his wealth.

Mr Zuckerberg started Facebook in his dorm room in 2004. What began as a closed networking site for Harvard students is now a global communications force with nearly two billion members.

In a commencement speech, Mr Zuckerberg said he wants to make the world more open and connected despite criticism his company has faced.

Tech pro Mr Zuckerberg speaks at Harvard in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Getty Images North America

He told the graduates how, when Facebook’s investors and executives wanted him to sell the company early on, he resisted. “You see, my hope was never to build a company, but to make an impact,” he said.

But as a young CEO, he never explained this to his co-workers, and the subsequent fight “tore our company apart.”

“I wondered if I was just wrong, an impostor, a 22 year-old kid who had no idea how the world worked,” Zuckerberg said. “Now, years later, I understand that is how things work with no sense of higher purpose. It’s up to us to create it so we can all keep moving forward together.”

Dame Judi Dench also received an honorary degree at the same ceremony.

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