High School Seniors/College

[RECHRGD]

Some of the dumbest people I've ever been in contact with were in possession of some pretty impressive degrees.  These people are usually the ones that the parents made them go and they somehow got through it.  Some may and some may not ever put their degrees to work.  Both of my daughters wanted to go off to college without a clue of what to master in.  The main reason was that they had friends that were going to go to these schools.  I told them "no way" until they had some direction.  They tried different courses at the community college and never would stick with anything.  They're both now married with kids and have enough smarts and talent to survive own their own if they needed to.  My point being; that it would have been a huge waste of money and time for them to have gone to college right after high school.  Most kids don't have the maturity to know what they want to do in life and with all the choices out there now-a-days it's much harder than it used to be.  I envy the few youngsters that really have/had the materity and drive to go after that degree or training that will keep them in a career that they enjoy through their lifetime.  It's not all about money.  Some of the happiest people I've known have not possessed much wealth.
I quit in my senior year of high school but took some business courses in the community college later, but still no degree.  I got my education through the school of hard knocks.  Started in retail, then became an electrician, later started my own SUCCESSFUL contracting firm and since moving to the Northwest have been a senior project manager for a large Electrical Contractor.  I have had a good career, but never really enjoyed it.  Two hours ago, just down the hall, our Senior Estimator had to go the hospital with chest pains.  He's a good ten years younger than me.  I haven't felt very good lately myself.  I was planning on retiring in a few months.  Maybe I'll bump that up to a few days.    Bob

[Rolling_Thunder]

well...     i being a college student find a college degree almost manditory for any executive type job...         my opinion is to go to college but hey - its his life.

[73dodge]

I did not go to college and joined the Navy, I went into avionics and got a job fixing computers in 1988 when they were no PC's just mainframes and minicomputers. The Navy gave me the skills that I could have never gotten anywhere else. If he is thinking of joining the miltary make sure he gets into something that will give him the skills later in life.

my .02

[Mike DC]

   
I think a lot of the situation depends greatly on the circumstances. 
Depending on the person, the school, the situation, the career . . .  different advice for each variable. 
The kid doesn't have to want to go to college right now.  That's not a sign of craziness.  It's possible for him to be aware that he needs higher education eventually, but still feel like he shouldn't be going right now. 

The only point that I really think is 100% applicable to everyone is this:
The vast, vast, vast majority of the population does not end up being successful/content without SOME FORM of higher education or skilled job training.   

You only need to get REALLY worried about him if he honestly thinks he can put together a decent life without getting trained/educated at something eventually.  That  particular viewpoint is a real inaccuracy for 99% of the population, and in that case he DOES need to be informed of how unrealistic his thinking is.

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Why doesn't he want to go to college, specifically? 

--  If he's plain-old sick of doing homework, then he probably just shouldn't go to college right now.  Let him work for a while.  As long as he doesn't go into major debt or start having kids, he's still pretty likely to end up in college in the next few years.
But in this case, it's worth noting that the local friends may be a real drag next year.  Big numbers of his classmates will probably leave town next year for schooling/military/etc.  That means the kids that are still around will be disproportionately dead-enders.  (Of course not ALL of them will be dead-enders, but it will be a much higher percentage than right now in high school.)  It isn't great for anyone's mindset when suddenly their more successful friends all move away at the same time, and now they're left spending their time with the other percentage.

--  If the kid is saying, "I'm not sure I'm gonna be able to hack it in college," then he may be VERY correct and he's trying to save you a whole bunch of money.  Listen to him on that.  And if he gets talked into going to college even though he didn't think he wanted to, and then he eventually fails at school . . . that's even worse.  He not only blows some money & grades, but he also loses the belief in himself to succeed at it.  That situation may very well do him more harm than if he hadn't gone to college at all.

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College wasn't always what I expected. 

--  I thought it was gonna be so academically difficult.  But the first couple of years of undergrad were no harder than most of my high school classes.  Some were much easier.

--  I thought the mindset of the student body was gonna be so much different from high school, but it wasn't really.  Just another year or two older, but no smarter or more mature or anything.  Plenty of them were even dumber than my high school friends.  (And that's an accomplishment.)

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I thought some people knew what they wanted to do with their careers at the time.  Almost none of them really did.  Some thought they knew but they were wrong.  Some didn't even think they knew, but they just picked a major and went with it.  Some were doing a major that they never thought they'd work in, and ended up doing it for a living. 

My point here is that nobody else in his position knows jack squat either.  Some kids are more proactive about committing to something at the time & having a plan for the next 4 or 5 years, but that's not the same thing as actually having things figured out and being correct about it ten years later.