NP: Shuffle Songs

I've thought for a long time that the notion that every American teenager should proceed immediately to college is ridiculous. A lot of this was fueled by two of my best friends growing up. One took a job with Bell Labs for a couple of years before eventually pursuing a degree. The other took about half a year of community college before going on to work on boats for a living. These were people I knew really well, and from a "knowledgeable outsider" perspective, I always felt like their decisions were well-suited to their personalities. I think both of them are pretty happy with where they're at now.

So, anyway, I thought this article does a nice job of presenting this as a legitimate issue worth debating. I would expand the argument to say that I'd like to see more flexibility on the notion that you should go to college immediately after high school, which is a little bit different than saying college, in and of itself, may not be for everyone. I felt like my first year of school, in particular, could have been more useful if I were maybe a bit more mature, although that may be based on what I learned in that first year more than it had to do with general experience.

I realize that this opinion, much like my "preference" for raising kids in the city instead of fleeing to the suburbs like so many people do, is really easy for me to hold, because I have no kids and likely won't every have to test these theories with my own offspring. But I do think it's worth thinking about.

And all bets are off if we're talking about Bootsy Collins' new University of Funk. That one's a must for anyone and everyone, as soon as humanly possible. And I understand if you think that's really an Onion story.