No regrets, I looked smart to my first employer, they were all MIT, Yale, Carnegie Melon graduates. Heck, they thought I graduated from CalTech. Even, my first coworker out of that job is now a chip guru, he held executive positions at company like Tesla, Apple, Intel, AMD, he graduated from Penn State, the rest of the people who went to MIT, Yale, CM all disappeared, nobody became famous, unless you count the professor at Princeton.
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I am a partly homeschooling mom (off and on over the years for some of my kids). I’ve been a SAHM for 22 years and I don’t regret my college degree at all. I worked for a grand total of 5 intense years post grad before having kids. Granted it’s different with crippling debt but since it’s done and in the past don’t beat yourself up - you are worth it to have a higher education. It’s a part of you and a part of your life story. hugs.
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Sigh…lots of regrets, the biggest of which is going into six figures of debt for medical school.
I started off in community college because I had been a high school dropout who later went back and earned a GED. I didn’t qualify for freshman admission to the state university since I lacked the proper high school credits. Overall, community college worked out well for me, as I had a great experience academically and the price couldn’t be beat ($381 per semester for a full load! Including parking!) I did not need to take out any loans my first two years and was able to work to pay my housing and other expenses, However, I will concede, I do feel like I missed out on a lot of the college experience, including the opportunity to live in a dorm and experience the full spectrum of college life.
I earned my A.S. degree with honors and later transferred to the state flagship university, where I initially didn’t adjust so well to being a transfer student. Eventually, I managed to graduate, then applied to medical school, but was initially rejected. I then worked for a few years, got married, and later attended graduate school at the same state flagship, which I found to be a much better fit for graduate school than undergrad. Actually, graduate school turned out to be some of the best days of my life, as I enjoyed the small, interactive seminars and close relationships with both other students and professors.
After earning my graduate degree, I re-applied and was accepted to medical school on the third try. I graduated in four years with my MD, but was never able to complete residency due to the need to care for a disabled family member. So…years later, I have all the debt of most physicians but a tiny fraction of the income. Currently, I earn just enough as an adjunct faculty member to pay the minimum payment on my student loans. I have already accepted that, unless I win the lottery or something drastically changes, I will likely never be able to pay off my loans. Even if I qualify for $10K or $20K of loan forgiveness, that would just be a drop in the bucket.
So…if I had it to do over, I wish I had chosen to pursue a Ph.D. or pharmacy degree rather than an M.D. I’m thinking pharmacy would likely offer more flexible hours and wouldn’t necessarily require a residency, which at 80 hours per week isn’t an option with my caregiving responsibilities. Other than teaching, there just aren’t a lot of job options for an M.D. with no residency training and my full-time caregiving responsibilities will likely always prevent me from working full time outside the home
At one point, I had the opportunity to go to college and medical school free of charge in Europe. In retrospect, I wish I had taken advantage of this opportunity rather than go into six figures of debt to attend a U.S. medical school. Of course, hindsight is always 20/20 and when I started medical school, I had no way of knowing what the future would hold.
As far as my child is concerned- my own regrets about missing out on college life prompted me to urge him to strongly consider attending a 4-year residential liberal arts college. He had already earned an Associate degree as part of his high school program. In the end, however, he chose the honors college at our state flagship university, in part because they accepted all of his Associate dual enrollment credits- he just started last week, so hopefully this was the right choice! Both choices were equally affordable, but in the end, he decided he wasn’t ready to move far away from home.
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I loved my undergraduate school. Worked very hard. Learned a lot. Played on a minor varsity sport. I remain friends with quite a number of folks and go to reunions every five years. As a middle class Jewish kid, I did learn a lot about how to interact in the upper class WASP social milieu. Regrets: I started college at one of HYP at age 16. I think a gap year to develop social skills might have been good, but people didn’t do gap years back in the Stone Age.
I regret not having taken a gap year between college and grad school. I was exhausted from producing a very strong undergraduate thesis (I was told it would have been the best PhD thesis in the grad school department at one of the schools I attended) just wasn’t the best idea. I did take a break for a year before switching to a second grad school. At my second grad school, I learned a few things about how to walk in the pathways of power.
I believe that my education helped prepare me for the career I have had, which has been fulfilling (it is interesting, gives me a sense of meaning, and has been financially reasonably rewarding). So no regrets about where I went to school. My only regrets are not taking things a break here and there along the way. I think I started my post-doc at age 27 and started professing at age 28.
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I actually have more friends from college now than I did in college. How? Well, in the last 5-6 years we started having reunions of our sorority sisters. Some of these women I hardly knew in college or they joined the chapter after I left. Many are pretty interesting people and I share more with them now (quilting, travel, children) than I did while in college (mostly drinking and partying, and some of these women didn’t do that). But we share some memories of the past and build on them. One was at the (no-go) space launch this morning and I can’t wait to hear about it. She worked on the space station arm at NASA for many years, but on the way to Florida she stopped at the quilt museum in Kentucky. Want to hear about that too.
I also have a core group of friends from the sorority who I see monthly. Two are godmothers to my kids. Some I’ve traveled with over the years.
College? Wasn’t perfect and I should have majored in something like accounting or engineering, but my life worked out okay. Definitely wasn’t a waste of time.
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I was younger, naive, insecure and very immature. If I could go back in time, i would pick my best college option instead of picking nearest and cheapest.
I would pick a more interesting career path instead of going for most lucrative one. I would focus more on my self and worry less about making a good impression on others.
I would make my own mistakes, instead of listening to other people’s opinions and experiences. I’ll focus more on learning and extracurricular experiences, instead of focusing on grades and ranks.
I would live in present and enjoy that, instead of worrying about how every choice would effect the future.
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From what to what (type of college and field)?
Hmm, she’s advertising water coolers on her profile…
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Yes, I noticed that earlier 
but didn’t flag it because she hasn’t violated any ToS (I think?)
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