This past April, my oldest came home from college for an unexpected weekend visit. While he talked positively about friends, classes, and his job on campus, he also mentioned he wasn’t sure about his major and was looking into other possibilities. Seemed about right. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, 80% of all college students change their major at least once with the majority of students changing their major three or more times. But I was still surprised when Isaac came home in May and said he was not planning to return to college in the fall. He didn’t need a change in course of study, he wanted a change altogether. He thoroughly and maturely explained how he reached this decision and why it was best for him at this time. He had just completed his sophomore year of college and felt boxed in, under pressure, and wanted some room to think. Chuck and I responded honestly — with surprise and a little disappointment. We also offered our support for Isaac as he transitioned away from college.
But to be honest, I was in shock. I mean, there are only so many times you can tell your kid to find their own path to happiness before they are bound to take you up on the offer. But still. Isaac’s path was not going to be the one I thought he would pick. He was no longer interested in having a traditional college experience despite all the hype and attention we had given this course of action over his lifetime. Both Chuck and I went to college at 18, graduated within four years, and began careers for which our major prepared us. We never regretted making these choices and have always talked so fondly about our college and early married days together. But here my oldest was telling me this wasn’t the route for him. Once faced with this new reality, I opened my eyes and saw there are so many different paths to adulthood and for some reason, I had overlooked them.
I come from a traditional household: mom, dad, sibling. I was told by my parents that I would graduate from high school, go to college, and get a college degree in four years. Once that was done, I was all grown up and whatever came next was only limited by my imagination. I did exactly that. Chuck’s parents had given him the same set of instructions. Despite my parents’ plans for me, they themselves had a very different path to adulthood, one that involved getting married in their teens, joining the US Navy during the Vietnam war, and having a baby (hello!) before getting through college.
As I looked around at my friends and extended family, I found very few examples of what I had come to call the traditional timeline. I have friends who got married before graduation, got married instead of graduation, and friends who took five years or more to graduate. I have dear friends who chose to join the military, take entrepreneur paths, attend a trade school, and apply for union apprenticeships. I have friends who are artists, with specialized degrees from specialized schools; friends with liberal arts degrees, and plenty with no degree whatsoever. They are all pretty fantastic people. As a non-traditional law student and graduate student, I can’t even begin to count the number of people I met who were just like me. We were proud of what we brought back to the college experience having successful job experiences and really really good time management skills!
As friends and family asked me about Isaac’s plans in the fall, I succinctly explained Isaac was working and not going to school at the moment. Anything else is really his story to tell. Any trepidation I had about his decision has fallen away as I’ve discovered more and more folks who, either themselves or their children, made a similar choice. It made me wonder how exactly this “traditional timeline” became so ingrained in our society. My friends who work on a college campus will tell you retention rates have become the new buzzword over the last several years, as colleges work to keep more and more students within this traditional path (and their own funding secure in insecure times). As it turns out 57% of students enrolled in college are still working on their first degree after six years. Of those 57%, 33% will drop out of college entirely without finishing a degree. Another enlightening statistic found in a recent study by USA Today: 74% of all undergraduates currently enrolled in college are nontraditional students. Amazing.
So maybe it’s time for a shift in perspective. A four year degree completed consecutively after high school graduation in preparation for a career is one way to do it. But there are so many other ways! Let’s support all of them! Maybe we should make gap years available to anyone who needs it, instead of just the privileged. Maybe we could focus on offering kids opportunities to learn about the world they inhabit and less time administering aptitude tests to 12-year-olds and getting them on a career track before they can drive.
How about you? Anyone else out there charting their own course?
I love this line – “… there are only so many times you can tell your kid to find their own path to happiness before they are bound to take you up on the offer.”
I think that’s the hardest thing about parenting – preparing our kids for adulthood but also accepting and respecting what path they take there.
I also wish there was more discussions about choices after high school. The perspective I always got was if you were “smart” you went to a 4-yr university. If you weren’t, you went to a trade school or junior college. So I felt pressure because of my grades that I should only look at universities. When in reality it would have served me better to go to a community college or an art school. But that always felt “beneath” me because of the expectations I perceived.
We try now to share lots of options with our kids. Not all career paths look the same.