When I was in my junior year of high school, school guidance counselors and parents really began pushing the college thing.  There was a lot of stigma placed on career colleges and vocational schools, let alone on the decision to not go to college at all, so the entire thing — in my mind — turned into one big elitest fiasco.  As a result, I took four years off and didn’t go back to school until it actually suited me, rather than some ideal a bunch of adults had in mind for me.

To this day, though, I don’t know why exactly career colleges and vocational schools have such a bad rap.  Realistically, they do the exact same thing as a traditional four-year college: prepare you for the real world.  Take Brown Career College, for example.  Although a lot of people wouldn’t consider this a traditional college, they offer some really great programs in business, technology, criminal justice, and design.

In retrospect, high school graduates and returning students probably shouldn’t worry so much about what other people think of their college choices — they should just attend the school that suits their career and educational needs the best.

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