> Starting college a few years older than everybody else will almost certainly have other advantages in terms of your maturity and self-discipline, especially if you've already been out in the "real world" with a job before then, so it shouldn't be seen as something which will hinder either your college study, or your future employment prospects.

Amen. It's what I did, and while it's a little frustrating to still have a year of school when most of my peers from home have been out and working a year, I don't regret it at all. For me, it was more about not knowing what I wanted in a college that made me hold off, rather than not having the money... though as it turns out, when I finally did decide to go I won an incredible scholarship, which I probably would not have gotten without the extra two years' growth and experience.

Even if you have some ideas of what school you want to go to, what you want to major in, and what you want to do after you graduate, I think holding off on college can be a good idea. You learn stuff about yourself in that extra year or two that helps tremendously in making big life decisions. It seems like half the students at my school transferred either into it or out of it in the middle of their college careers. Approaching your college decisions a few years later might save you from having to make such costly changes down the road.

Also, getting gen ed requirements out of the way at a community college can be really nice, in freeing you up to take more interesting higher-level courses once you get to the school of your choice. My general point, I suppose, is that if you have to take a year or two off and either work full-time or take a few courses at a community college, don't consider it a loss. Those who take a slightly unconventional path are often rewarded. I should know.

Lire"just 2.5 yards off the beaten track for 23 years and counting"lyn