This was a part of a speech given by President Obama. It is one reason why people who go to community Colleges (at least this is true in California) can transfer up to a university with a C or better average as Juniors. Because for every 5 kids that start at a University or College only 1 kid actually gets a degree before they are 25. So even of everyone who attends college at 17 or 18 years of age out of 5 of them only 1 graduates by 25 with a degree. So, this means that 91% of the kids in the U.S. do not have a college degree by age 25. However, I have noticed that literally everyone who gets a degree by 25 has an easier life economically afterwards. Because of the focus and diligence it takes to get ANY College degree makes for much more critical thinking and better choices in general of these people ongoing throughout their lives.
So, for example, if you traced how many college graduates live to 80 to 100 it would be an amazing study compared to other kids that live to be 20 or 30 years old at least to begin with. So, college has a lot to do with having quality of life choices and better outcomes in general in one's life. It is not a guarantee but a tendency to create a much better life (whatever it is worldwide) with a college degree to start with.
In my own case I started a community College (Glendale College) when I was 18. After starting many courses and finishing some of them, especially courses in computer programming and computer operations. Though I didn't finish any college degrees there or transfer from there to a 4 years institution. But, what it did do was to give me my first career as a computer programmer and as a computer operator which I did both part time (while attending college full time) and also full time for about 1 year before I was 21 years old. So, just attending college for less then one year gave me my first career as a computer programmer and computer operator. I bought myself a brand new 1968 Camaro and people saw me as a successful computer programmer and I was only 19 or 20 years old. Those were very heady times for me. So, even though I didn't get a degree at first just the courses I took gave me a very high paying job and allowed me to buy a really beautiful and fast sports car which I found really great at the time.
Eventually, I realized I couldn't do what I wanted with that career because RAM wasn't available yet, personal computers weren't available yet (this was 1966 to 1969) and so I gave up on my first career because I found it tedious to the extreme without RAM or Personal Computers or Microchips in place yet in people's lives. But, it was a very heady time of instant personal success in business and eventually led to me owning businesses of various kinds starting in my late 20s as I took more and more courses during especially my early twenties at Palomar College from 1971 to 1973 in San Diego County. Continuing my studies wherever my interests led me made me successful in business and in my personal life as well. keep studying things that interest you. You never know where those interests and dreams will take you in the future. They have taken me all over the world since then and I have met people in Europe, Nepal, Japan, India, Thailand, Hawaii, Scotland, England, Mexico and Canada and all my kids have been all over the world too. So, it isn't just my life that changed it changed all my children's lives too to where they are all sort of citizens of the world and not afraid to get a on plane and travel to almost any place interesting.
It all started with me going to college in 1966.
So, even though I still don't have a college degree I have 8 years of college now under my belt with majors of Computer science and engineering, Anthropology, Psychology, with research studies conducting polls in Social Science, many creative Writing Classes and meeting amazing students and professors from all over the world. All my oldest kids (3 of them ages 39 to 42 have bachelors degrees or more) and my two youngest are working on theirs or will be when the last one graduates High school this year. Also, one of my two god daughters has two masters degrees and my other god daughter is at her Junior Year in college but now makes so much money as a sommelier (wine steward) there are 4 tested levels of this. (One can make $100,000 a year or more doing this by the way if one is at one of the higher levels of accreditization).
But, it all started for me in 1966 choosing to go to college and study about computers and computer programming and learning about how computers worked which I have kept up on now through 7 to 10 or more generations of computer technology and programming as a hobby ever since.
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