Four years of high school have come and gone, and now the students sit amongst their peers on graduation day. It is the middle of May and the sun is blazing through their shiny caps and gowns as they anxiously sit and wait for their principle to butcher their names in front of their whole class. The scariest part being, the second they cross that stage with diploma in hand everything will change. The days of ditching first period and having their moms call them out for they are too tired are over. Ultimately the question is; where will they go? The next step, however, will be much short of a destination, and much more along the lines of a journey. For most high school graduates, the decision is clear. The first choice is college; four or more years indebted to a major with or without an occupation in mind. The second choice, entering the real world, however, is best fit. With every teenager around having a different perspective of what their post-high school agenda will look like, the common denominator lies in the idea of achieving success. Unfortunately, a stigma clouds the idea of pursuing life without a degree. However, this stigma does not hold the facts, and in today's day and culture the saying “college is not for everyone” could not be more applicable. College is not for everyone and attending college is not necessary for success, while in college job opportunities are not necessarily being provided or promised, most students and graduates are dealing with potential student loans which will prolong success and meanwhile self-education can be much more beneficial for some people.

The typical end goal of college is a job and in today's day and age real success can’t be obtained without an occupation of some sort. Essentially college is an investment, the idea is to pay upfront for a degree that hypothetically will result in a job and pay itself off “About 1.5 million, or 53.6 percent, of bachelor's degree-holders under the age of 25 last year were jobless or underemployed, the highest share in at least 11 years.” (theatlantic.com). The youth of America enter into college typically at the age of eighteen, work and study hard for years hoping that their efforts will result in some sort of gratification, however, a little over half of these people are ending up out of work. Concurrently, there is another half of these students who are obtaining jobs following receiving a college education. The majority of these jobs, however, are the same ones that people with no degrees are able to come by. Therefore, these students have pushed through various years of education and discipline just to be considered equals in the workforce with people who didn’t. Whether college is on the agenda or not, if a job is what the end goal is then there is still a dice being rolled.

Matthew Charles "Matt" Mullenweg is an American online social media entrepreneur, web developer and musician living in San Francisco, California (ma.tt.com). Just like many people, Matthew had a clear vision of success and came to the realization that college wasn't a necessary factor in acquiring it. “Mullenweg dropped out of the University of Houston in 2004. Even then, he was so precocious that he didn't bother with their computer classes. At 20, he had already developed the beginnings of WordPress and was fielding job offers from tech companies. He dropped out to work for CNET in San Francisco, with a promise that he could continue developing his side project 15 percent of the time.”(buisnessinsider.com) Mullenweg is and has been one of the youngest yet most successful people in America to this day. Matthew Mullenweg’s story along with the numbers of the people who get jobs following college and the legitimacy of those jobs show that an occupation can be materialized into success without any real college degrees and while in college job opportunities are not being provided nor promised.

If job opportunities being limited and a matter of luck doesn't go far enough in displaying that college is unnecessary for success, then pondering the fact that only twenty-two percent of American’s can really afford a college education, should better illustrate (mintpressnews.com). Parallel, that certainly does not go to say that eighty-eight percent of Americans do not attend college period. What lies ahead for the fraction of people who do decide that they will pursue a college education despite their economical situation is; student loans. Although these student loans do tremendous help to people, ultimately they do more than their fair share of hurt simultaneously. “Student debt delays spending, saving and marriage, About three-quarters of student loan borrowers surveyed said they -- or their children -- have been forced to make sacrifices in order to keep up with student loan payments, according to a survey from the American Institute of CPAs. Forty-one percent of the more than 200 people surveyed said they have delayed saving for retirement, 40 percent have put off buying cars, while 29 percent have postponed home purchases” (money.cnn.com). Not only do student loans prolong economic success but they prolong personal success. The unprecedented levels of student debt have conspired to shatter the traditional American Dream for many young people who aspire to a middle-class lifestyle.”Last year, student debt in the U.S. surpassed $1 trillion, and for the first time exceeded the total amount of credit card debt, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York,

At the same time, the default rate on student loans is rising: The Department of Education said last September that 8.8 percent of borrowers had defaulted in their first two years of repayment, up from seven percent the previous year.” (buisnessinsider.com) Student loans prolong success in life and these loans are a direct causation of college.

The most interesting of all ideas to ponder, is the percentage of people who learn better self-educating but are still paying student loans to sit in classrooms that are not benefiting them. Auto-didacticism or self-education is the act of self-directed learning about a subject or subjects. The biggest negative stigma wrapped around not attending college is the idea that one will be unintelligent or uninformed. College is not the only source of knowledge when looking back in history some of the people who contributed the most intellect to our world had never been prestigious in the classroom or held a diploma from any fancy university.

Cara Wilton being a fine example of one of the women whom self-educated herself which led to new found knowledge for her and success in today’s age. Cara taught herself how to build websites, she read book after manual after article in order to not only have the most up to date designs but the vastest knowledge on the mechanics behind it. Cara recounts; “"I spent hours looking at coding then trying it out on my page. I quickly picked up patterns. If you want things to lie vertically, you should add a float. I noticed he always put clear:both in his footer. If I left it out, the page would not flow down, but instead, parts would disappear when viewed in my browser. I would then follow this up by using Google to find articles written about floats and so learned that a float must be cleared so that the natural flow of the page which is vertical can be re-established" (sixrevisions.com). Self-education can be the perfect path to success for somebody who doesn't thrive in a classroom setting. Many people along with Cara Wilton have self-educated themselves into careers and this has resulted in many of their success.

Despite the idea of self-education, and the financial components of a college education, many believe that college should be on the agenda sheerly to gain more intelligence. Gaining a degree will help with vast knowledge on a particular subject many insist. However, experts argue that attending college has become less about learning actual skills and more about simply paying to have a degree. Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses, published earlier this year by the University of Chicago Press, found that 36 percent of college students “did not demonstrate any significant improvement in learning during their college educations” (usnews.com). Therefore although, many argue that a college education should be obtained to increase one's general knowledge and have a specialization, ultimately universities and colleges have become less focused on education and more centered on the degree.

As a high school graduate life can go many ways but will always begin with the same question, college or not? The stigma against not attending college should be relinquished for success without college is common and jointly is not a necessary factor for success. While in college job opportunities are by no means being provided nor promised, statistics prove that the majority of students with a bachelor's degree will not exceed high school graduates with job salaries and more than half of college graduates are unemployed. Also, with taking the path of no college prolonging success due to student loans is not a part of the agenda . Students claim they must put a hold on spending, saving, and marriage for they must first pay off the loans for the degree that did nothing for them. Lastly, college really isn't for many and most times for the people that college doesn't appeal to self-education is a better and wiser route, self-education can be nothing but beneficial for many people. In summary, lessening Job opportunities, ridiculous student loans and self-education all come together to show a college nor a university is necessary for success.