@IABooks, heh.
The US higher educational system actually offers more flexibility and routes for kids to find what they like to do and their passions than those of most other countries. In unis in most other countries (first world and otherwise), you typically decide what subject to study before uni and then study only that. If you find out that you don’t like it or don’t have the aptitude for it, the only option is to drop out and start all over again. And I’m not even mentioning tracking. Countries like Germany and Switzerland have strong apprenticeship systems (programmers in Germany and bankers and Switzerland typically rise up from the apprentice ranks rather than go to college), but you either head down the apprenticeship track or uni track pretty early in HS.