Son selects music college over traditional college

If anyone would have told me that I would have ever agreed to that I would have said they were crazy.  Until very recently I believed that graduating from college today was like graduating from High School back in my day.  You need to do it to achieve any modicum of success.

But like so many other lessons I’ve learned from my son, he opened my eyes to reconsidering that belief.  Many of you know that my son didn’t choose the traditional career path and neither did he choose a traditional college.  My son plans to be a rock star and he is going to a music college.  And there’s no doubt in my mind that if gets signed with a band before he graduates, he’ll drop out of school.

Just a couple of weeks ago I learned that one of my son’s girlfriends from High School is going to a golf college to learn to be a golf pro.  I didn’t know there was such a school.

And recently I saw that the average wage for a car mechanic is $36,000 a year.  That’s about the same as the average wage of a journalist.  One has to attend a four year college; the other attends a technical college for a much shorter period of time. So what’s the benefit of the college degree?

Then there’s a-whole-nother concept that completely blows me away…..kids graduating from High School are going into business for themselves.  A friend of mine is very successful as an Independent Rep for an online travel firm.  His son opted out of a football scholarship to college to learn the ropes from his dad.  One year later, Jr. is making $100,000+.  Of course he had the advantage of learning from a very successful dad.  But I know the business and I think a young person with an entrepreneurial mind could start their own business right out of High School and make at least as much money as a car mechanic or journalist in Year 1 even without a father or mother in the business.

There are so many ways for young people to make a living now. I just hope each one of them is able to make a living doing something they love; whatever that something is. Isn’t that really what we all want for our kids?  Happiness and enough money to live comfortably.