Here’s why Mark Zuckerberg is finally getting his Harvard degree

Wish you didn’t have to do all the work in college to get your degree? Just drop out, start a multi-billion dollar company, pledge tens of billions of dollars of your profits to charity and then come back to give a graduation speech 13 years later.

It worked for Mark Zuckerberg.

Harvard University officials told the Harvard Gazette last week that the Facebook CEO would be the commencement speaker for the class of 2017. That means Zuckerberg will get an honorary degree from the university as well, according to Harvard Magazine, as is Harvard’s custom.

“Mark Zuckerberg’s leadership has profoundly altered the nature of social engagement worldwide. Few inventions in modern times can rival Facebook in its far-reaching impact on how people around the globe interact with one another,” Harvard President Drew Faust told the Gazette. “And few individuals can rival Mark Zuckerberg in his drive to change our world through the innovative use of technology, as well as his commitment to advance science, enhance education, and expand opportunity through the pursuit of philanthropy.”

Zuckerberg dropped out of Harvard in 2004 as a sophomore, after he and a group of friends started a site originally called thefacebook.com. He’s not the first tech billionaire to drop out of Harvard and be welcomed back to the school to give a commencement speech – Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, dropped out of the university in 1975 and came back to give the speech in 2007.

Harvard managed to get the two billionaires in a room together for a slightly awkward video, where Zuckerberg asks Gates for advice on the speech.

Gates tells Zuckerberg the best part of the speech is getting the degree.

“You don’t even have to go to class?” Zuckerberg asks.

“No, no, you just put that degree on your resume and it looks great,” Gates says, adding that Zuckerberg shouldn’t “wear anything underneath” his hat and robe.

Not all colleges hand out honorary degrees to commencement speakers automatically. Steve Jobs, the late founder of Apple, gave a famous graduation speech at Stanford University in 2005, but the drop out of Reed College didn’t receive an honorary degree for it.

Zuckerberg will speak to the Harvard class of 2017 on May 25.

This story was originally published March 13, 2017 at 5:41 AM with the headline "Here’s why Mark Zuckerberg is finally getting his Harvard degree."