<p>Hi guys. I need some advice.</p>
<p>I'm a freshman. I did very well in high school and graduated top of my class, but I made the mistake of only applying to expensive private schools, and even though I got scholarship money, it didn't cover enough. My parents have a high income, so we get very little financial aid, but they can't afford much more than their bills. So I chose the cheapest school and last semester I went to a private university. I didn't really like it there, and it was very expensive (and so not worth the cost). So I decided to get out of there. Problem was I waited too long to make up my mind, and by the time I did, it was too late to apply to any other schools for Spring semester. I thought about taking a semester off, but if I was out of school for 6 months I would have to start paying back the loan I took out for that ****hole.</p>
<p>So I transferred to my local community college. Almost done with the semester, but going there is killing me. The only thing I've learned is that there are some incredibly lazy, stupid people in the world. There's no social life, I have no friends there, no clubs to join or things to do. I could have passed the classes in 6th grade. I'm not challenged, the professors are nice, but very easy. It's like high school all over again. It sucks. I thought I would be able to handle it since I know I'm saving so much money, but my god, it's crushing my soul going there.</p>
<p>So there's that. But there are a lot of other reasons that I'm considering dropping out.</p>
<p>One, I really don't know what I want to do. Well, I sort of have some ideas, but most are nothing I need to go to school for. I'd love to be a writer and everyone tells me I'm good at it, but since I have to waste so much of my time ********ting papers, I don't have a lot of time to spend working on my creative writing. I'm also very interested in film, but I don't even have a camera so I can't really do much with that on my own at the moment. I've also thought about owning a restaurant or bakery, but I know that that's hard to do. I've kind of thought about veterinary technology too, but vet techs don't get paid much. Basically, anything I know I would enjoy doing usually has a very low salary, and even though I don't want to have a job I hate, I don't want to live paycheck to paycheck either. I want to do something creative, something I'm good at and enjoy.</p>
<p>Two, there are no good schools in my area for writing or film or communication, at least none that I know of or would like to go to. I live in south NJ, where in-state tuition is crazy high and the schools suck anyway. There's a university pretty close to me that has film, but I don't think it's a good program, it doesn't have a strong reputation at least, and I really don't want to live at home anymore, but of course it would save money. I want to go to school in a big city (but a relatively decent city, not Philly!), in a large school with an urban feel. I hate the suburbs. But then I'll have to pay out of state tuition and room and board.</p>
<p>Three, I don't care what anyone says, a college degree doesn't guarantee a thing anymore and is becoming pretty useless. I think it's like 40% of recent grads can't find jobs, right? Maybe at one time a degree meant something, but today it doesn't. I already have a pretty substantial loan that I have to pay back for ONE semester - I don't want to have a 100k+ debt that I can't pay back because I can't find a job. College is a business and I'm tired of buying into the crap.</p>
<p>That doesn't change the fact that I'm scared to death of dropping out. At the very least, spending another 3 years in college will push back having to face the "real world" for a bit.</p>
<p>And then there's my parents. They've made it very clear that they think I should be in college. I wanted to take a gap year after high school to try to get some idea of what I wanted to do, and they were completely against it. My mom especially. My dad told me he didn't agree with me but would support me, while my mom freaked out and yelled at me until I said I would go. And that was just because I wanted to take a gap year, so I can only imagine how she'll react if I tell her I want to drop out. The main thing holding me back from dropping out is my family. I don't want to disappoint them; they expect a lot from me and pretty much the only thing they care about is academics, they were never supportive of my art or writing or anything else I did. The truth is that the main reason I tried to do well in school was because I didn't want to disappoint them, and I'm so tired of doing things I don't want to do just so I don't disappoint other people.</p>
<p>I know college isn't for me. I feel it every time I step onto campus. Just because I do well in school doesn't mean I enjoy it. I'm not learning anything, I just memorize facts and write essays and I get A's. I thought college was supposed to expand your thinking, well, community college certainly hasn't done that for me, and the university I went to didn't either.</p>
<p>I'm still scared about leaving though. I haven't been able to find a real job (I babysit for some money), so what will happen if I can't find a job after I drop out or my parents kick me out of the house? I just want to pack my stuff and travel and move somewhere far away, but I can't exactly do that with no money.</p>
<p>I'm so confused right now. Thank you to anyone who took the time to read this, and thanks in advance for any advice you can give me.</p>