I just ran across this article, and it seems so much more timely for me now than it did when I saw it several years ago. You see, Bekka is now 18 and she isn't convinced that college is the place for her right now. I'm not convinced either.
She doesn't know what she wants to do - very few 18 year olds really do. For that matter, how many 30, 40, 50... year olds really do either? But is college really that great of a place to figure that out?
I spent 4 years in college, and, while I did come out with a reasonably lucrative career (accounting), it turned out that that wasn't what I wanted to do. I did do it for five years, but I'm pretty sure the cost of four years in college was definitely NOT worth it for my five-year career!
My dad had told us that as long as we graduated from college, he would be there to help us if we ever needed it financially. However, if we didn't graduate from college we were on our own. Besides, everyone I knew was going to college right after high school. It was what you did. You didn't really think about it, you just went. Only losers who worked at K-mart didn't go to school, right?
In general, the smart, ambitious kids went to college - but what if they didn't? What if they went out and traveled the world, started businesses, etc. as James Altucher is suggesting.
Bekka is certainly smart and ambitious - why shouldn't she travel the world, learn about people and more importantly, learn more about herself and how she fits into the world?
