Students don't seem to be getting much out of higher education (2018)
There&#x27;s several issues I&#x27;ve noticed as a student. First, kids are told to go to college immediately after high school. If college was high school 2.0, this would be fine. But college is completely different from high school; it&#x27;s significantly more expensive, more free form and more rigorous (at least compared to most high schools). I see so many students who clearly have no clue what they want to do, why they&#x27;re in college (beyond &quot;my parents want me to&quot;) or how to accomplish their goals.<p>Having seen the sheer quantity of kids struggling with simple stuff like cleaning, cooking and not drinking themselves to death, I&#x27;m becoming more and more in favor of a mandatory service at the age of 18. Maybe not military like the IDF, but some sort of program where kids are forced to go away from home and learn to be self sufficient. Little Bobby should learn how to scrub a pot and clean a bathroom before he&#x27;s entrusted with a 240k education. I took a gap year and I was significantly more focused and disciplined than I was in high school. And way better than the majority of my college peers.<p>But even worse than being unprepared for college, I feel like we&#x27;ve been fostering a poor attitude towards learning. I grew up in an academic family, so to me, learning wasn&#x27;t a stage of life. Learning was an essential aspect of being alive. Going to college wasn&#x27;t some arbitrary merit badge that society deems necessary. It was a natural extension of whatever field I wanted to study. I see college as a tool; I need to learn certain topics in order to get what I want in life. Of course, I&#x27;m very fortunate to have taken a gap year and worked as a programmer. If nothing else, I know that I like programming, I&#x27;m good at it and I&#x27;m willing to suffer through the painful parts. It&#x27;s kinda good to know that before I spent 240k on a CS degree.