Hi everyone,
What advice would you give a HS senior in US about to decide on and/or enter college ?
After flunking out of a state university and blowing any grants and what-not I worked for a while and also did 3 years in the military for the army college fund (which was fairly generious at the time, and also it was pretty safe in terms of going into battle back then.)
After that I was actually ready to go to school and had some earning potential. I did a transition program at a junior college. Learned a lot and paid for it without taking out student loans. Ultimately I dropped out in my senior year of civil engineering because the dot-com bubble created opportunities and I had learned some about programming as a kid (who had a C-64 computer to play with.) Also, after seeing and thinking about how and what civil engineers actually did, I didn't think I wanted to be one all of my life.
My main point would be that I found it the case that the lowly junior collage actually provided a discernably better education in some areas. In this case the math department was fantastic. Head and shoulders above the university. The smart and dedicated high school students (mostly Asian immigrants) set the standards which probably helped, but the staff were also a big factor.
If you actually want to learn shit, I think you can do so effectively at any institutution. Sappy as it sounds, 'you get out of it what you put in.' I've been out of it for so long that I don't know whether it is practical to get through with minimal or no student loans at this point, but if so, and if one has the maturity and interest, I'd say go for it. Else, spend a few years digging ditches which may improve one's attitude. Just don't develop debt or start a family during this phase or school will probably never be a realistic option.
Also, in retrospect, I feel that school is scientifically design to dampen thought and creativity and produce certain kinds of people who display certain kinds of behaviors deamed desirable by TPTB. This from pre-school through post-doc. School (with the possible exception of certain elite institutions for certain people) also will dilligently NOT teach certain things and discourage further exploration of them (e.g., 'what money actually is'.) If one can understand and watch for this, one can get what school has to offer without letting them fuck up one's head to much.