An 18-year-old startup founder shared his college admission essay after being rejected from some of the top schools in the country — and many readers were not impressed.

Zach Yadegari shared a post to X/Twitter on Monday about a slew of colleges he was rejected from. This included schools with notoriously low acceptance rates like Stanford University, Harvard University, Columbia University, Princeton University, Cornell University, Yale University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the University of Pennsylvania.

He was accepted into three less prestigious schools: the University of Miami, the University of Texas and Georgia Institute of Technology. The high school senior, who’s the founder of the app Cal AI, claimed his business is making $30 million a year, that he has a 4.0 GPA and scored a 34 on the ACT. The highest possible score you can get on the test is 36.

Yadegari followed up his post with screenshots of his college admissions essay, where he was asked to discuss an “accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others.”

His essay bragged about his achievements over the years, from starting coding at seven to publishing his first app on the App Store when he was 12. He claims to have earned $60,000 a year on his online gaming website by the time he was 14.

He explained that after moving to California to continue working on his startup, his mentors told him he “didn’t need college.” He then described the success of his company, with his team allegedly growing to 15 employees and Cal AI becoming “the fastest-growing app in its category.”

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However, once his app hit “one million dollars of revenue,” he felt like something was missing and questioned his “purpose.” He looked back on how he rejected the idea of going to college since he had bound himself “to another framework of expectations: the archetypal dropout founder.”

Ultimately, he said he realized college is “more than a mere rite of passage” and wanted to learn from other students and professors rather than just “computers or textbooks.”

Yadegari’s post has since racked up nearly 20 million views on X, with many people criticizing the student for being too self-aggrandizing and failing to address the question.

“I don’t want to dunk on some poor teenager but it is unbelievably obvious why a college would not admit someone based on a statement like this and I’m honestly bewildered there weren’t people in this kid’s life who tried to explain that to him,” one person wrote.

“It’s not even a bad essay in any vague literary sense, it’s just full of a lot of stuff that pretty clearly communicates 1) a major risk of dropping out and 2) no particular interest in the specific school or program. Both major red flags for admissions,” they explained.

“This reads like a braggadocious cover letter more than a personal statement that showcases who you are as a holistic individual outside of your accomplishments,” wrote a second person.

A third suggested: “Personal statement indicates that you’re a high probability to drop out so they gave your spot to someone that actually wants to graduate college.”

Others thought Yadegari didn’t share enough specifics about how he’d benefit from going to college.

“As a former admission office staff, I would say you might wanna connect the dots on how your experiences built your skillset, and align it with the major you are applying,” one person wrote. “How these skill sets would contribute to the school, and specify the course you wanna take (must state alignment as well).

“My view is that you didn’t get to the heart of what they were looking for until the final few paragraphs and it didn’t last long enough. You spent too much time on why you didn’t need college and not enough time on why it will benefit you and you will benefit the community,” another agreed.

However, other people defended Yadegari’s essay and were impressed by his achievements. Reddit founder Alexis Ohanian responded to the tweet saying: “That’s nuts.”

“I hope everyone dunking on the essay saves some energy to dunk on the requirements that led to it. Yes, it would have been better for his admissions chances to create a fake charity and have a ghostwriter write treacle about it. But this is how ambitious 17-year-old boys think,” another wrote. “Zach was honest, and had the cojones to share it.”

“It’s amazing how many want to deride you and nitpick you for this essay,” a third wrote. “I presume it’s to avoid dealing with the reality of the massive discrimination that’s happening…and what it says about our society that it’s still happening.”