Taking a year off before college?

bucknasty

bucknasty

Member
has anyone done this on this website? im 18 and im not ready to go college yet so im exploring possibilities for next year that could benefit me later on.... im applying to americorps but if anyone else has better ideas that are logical please share
 
im paying for college later on most likely, my parents may help out a little...i guess americorps gives you 5,000 towards college after serving for a year
 
i think thats dumb then u come in older than everyone and shit.

also ur only 18 so u cant really do that much why not wait till after college and take a year off that way ur older and shit idk i think its better to take one off after college
 
if you don't know what you want to do, I think it's a great idea. you have some time to sort things out and think, and get some great times in while you're at it. just make sure that you're making more money than you're spending
 
if i could go to the college i wanted to i would go but since i do not want to waste my time and end up dropping out from the one and only one i was accepted to, a year off sounds logical, plus its very late to rethink college
 
that is terrible advice. Tons of people come in older, especially hockey players and other athletes. One year won't matter at allll. Hell, I'm older than a lot of sophomores anyways just because I'm old for my grade (im a freshman). Go for americorps, i dont really know much about it but it should be sweeet
 
i went for a semester not knowing what i wanted to do. long story short i ended up taking a leave of absence for the second semester and its been great. ive done a few internships and made a lot of money working full time plus i got to ski a shitload. who cares how old you are there was a lady in one of my classes that was like 50.
 
if your ready go to school and get it over with, if you have you mind on doing other things like ski, do that.
 
nomenseven and skipig have great advice. taking a year or two off to travel is an awesome idea. like they said, it gives you time to think about what it is you really want to do, and it gives you a chance to experience a bunch of different things that you may or may not have experienced in college.

me personally, i took a year off and got a full time job digging trees, which took me to every western state so i did a lot of traveling and had lots of new experiences. moved to CO after that to ski, tried school out a little bit, and decided to move to Mt Baker instead.

point being: get out and travel, EXPERIENCE LIFE. go to school when your ready, but dont go to late (if there even is a too late this day and age, what with online schools and whatnot). plus, having the freedom to do whatever the fuck you want is really nice. being able to pack up and move to some killer resort whenever is a really cool feeling... especially when you actually do it.
 
be careful, alotta times when ppl take a year off they get a halfway decent job and make okay money and think its good enought and then dont go back to school. then they end up at a community college like 10 years later.

if you dont wanna go to a big school right off go to a comunity college and transfer its easy and can even make it easier to get into better schools
 
for sure mane. I wish I could go to college for the rest of my life and never have to pay it back. Its sick as fuck, so many hot ladies......it does get stressful but thus is life.....

 
i'd say do it. just make sure you are going to be able to go back to school in a year or two if that's what you want to do. it's easy to just stay out in the workforce. making mediocre dollars now seems like it's okay, but trust me, you don't want to be the 45 year old ski bum waiting tables or washing dishes in the back. get an education. it's defintely worth it.
 
even if you take a year off chances are you will end up switching majors once you start anyways, the whole college experience is much better that anything you could do taking a year off, the people you meet, vagina you dominate, beers you drink, cops you elude, etc.... you have your whole life after college to work, college will end and work will never untill you croak, so do not be intimidated by college, its a good experience you will enjoy, so spend money you dont have and party all night when you have an exam the next morning. just make sure you force yourself to get shit done when it needs to be and have fun
 
yo, go to college, get a degree, party it up and ski and shit and whenever u run outa dough then get a good job with the degree you got and then live your mature life with a family
 
i think if your going to take time off do it before college. if u take a year off and travel or ski bum for fun for a year after college, you sometimes never go back to your plans and then you wasted all that money on college, if you have that experience before going to college then if you dont go back to plans you didnt waste 30 g a year
 
what my uncle was going to do for me was before college, i would take the year of school and travel around the world and live on his boat and get a feel of the different cultures and learn overall general knowledge about places and things and maybe look around and try to get a feel for a future career. i think that is what i'm going to do but i don't know if this is something you could do or not depending on money and recourses and everything else.
 
One thing to consider is your parents health insurance. If you are on their insurance and you go off (age 18 and NOT a full time student means you get booted off of their insurance) you can never come back on to theirs and will have to provide your own.
 
If your going to take a year off DO SOMETHING. Go travel, go ski bum it somewhere. If you just stay around and work you might as well be in school. Alot of people dont realize, travelling is a learning experience you cant get in a class room. You become independent, your ability to deal with different scenarios gets better. But for the most part it allows you to make your own mind up about the world and the people in it. You realize things about your own country you never knew, you meet people from different nations that in thepast you have stereotyped and are just blown away by how different life is everywhere. For me it made me realize money isnt everything. You here alot about people living on virtually nothing, but when you see it, in some cases these people are completely content with there lives. They have food, family, a place to sleep, and the lifestyle the want. If you dont know what you want to do. Go travel, you'll learn more in that year then you will in your first year of university, garunteed.

and to the guy who says you come in older then everyone else. who cares. girls like older guys better anyways.
 
What do you mean you aren't ready for college? If you aren't ready for college then what the fuck else are you gonna do? You can't move away from home if you aren't even ready for college. You aren't ready for any real responsibility so any job outside of mowing your neighbors lawns is out of the question. If you just don't know what you want to do then go to college and find out. You aren't gonna figure it out sitting around at home. If you really aren't ready to go away somewhere or money is a problem then go to a community college. Take a variety of classes. Figure out what you like to do. If you take a year off you're probably not gonna go back to school.
 
if you dont think you are ready for college i would say take a year off. i didnt really think i was ready but i went anyway cause thats what everyone else did and i really regret it. i say take a year to save some money and collect your thoughts on what you want to do then after that year is over go do it.
 
if you take a year, youll become 1. a ski bum

2. end up not returning to school

3. go in the army

4. travelling

5. other
 
wow dude, way to look at the glass half full.

just because someone doesnt feel that they arent ready for college doesnt mean they arent ready for any "real" responsibility. how is college more of a "real responsibility than a "real" job? if you dont show up for class, your not going to get fired and kicked out of school (unless your a fucking idiot and dont go to any classes), where as if you dont show up for work, your ass is on the streets. and going to college to find out what you want to do in life is a WASTE OF MONEY, IMHO. lets say you take a variety of classes for a couple years trying to figure out exactly what you want to do. thats like 50g's down the drain and your not any closer to doing what you really want to do.

now if you go out and do your thing, maybe travel a little bit, have a handful of different jobs and once you experience one that you actually are good at/are interested in, then maybe its time to go back to school, get your degree, and do what you actually like doing. not what you THINK you like doing.

 
gap year program.

im down with that shit. i think im gonna do it after i graduate next year. call me crazy. i want to explore and know the real world before i head straight to my 13-16th years of school. i need a break.

plus, i might be playing D-1 or D-III hockey, and the average age for a hockey freshman is 22. ill be 17 as a freshman. ive got some time to grow
 
what I meant was that if he doesn't feel responsible enough for college then he isn't responsible enough for a job, for reasons you described. And its not a waste of 50 gs if he goes to a community college. Then its a waste of 5. Hell, in state tuition at almost every public university is barely going to be 50 thousand.
 
20, 50, who cares thats a lot of dough.

i agree, community college is a legit, economical way to go. 5g's isnt really THAT bad, getting a loan for that much isnt very hard and the payments can be relatively low. nothing a decent job could take care of.

the way you worded it made it sound to me like you were saying if you not going to university then give up all hope on school.
 
wow, let me re-do that last post.

why waste any money going to school right away only to drop out a year later, when you could use that money to travel and gain life experience? you can learn a lot of responsibility in a year or two, which can help you in school. knowing what it takes to do a job right, and get it done quickly is a skill that can be learned in the real world, and used in a classroom setting.

sorry about that last post, i didnt quote it, so i forgot exactly it was that you said. i didnt have anything to agree on.
 
I didn't read any of the other responses, but I am on a year off RIGHT NOW.

Part of the reason was because my parents didn't think I was ready (maybe a maturity thing - not a being away from home thing: I went to boarding school, so I was used to being away from home), but mainly because I was only accepted to safety schools which I wasn't stoked on. So I worked all summer and into the fall then went to Costa Rica to volunteer with wildlife conservation from september-november. Then I came home and worked tuning skis until the beginning of February. You can make really good money working in a ski shop if you find a good shop and you become really good at what you do. I was making $650 per week easy by the end of it. So I made quite a bit. So I left at the beginning of March to do a photography internship in South Africa. And it has been pretty awesome. I'm really glad that I took a year off.

There are quite a few internship and volunteer companies out there. The ones that I dealt with are Global Vision (Costa Rica, but it's a British company) and Connect-123 (S. Africa). I also dealt with i-to-i and I wouldn't recommend them. They were actually the ones that I initially went to Central America with, and the program turned out to be nothing close to what they advertized.

I'd say that if you do take a year off, do something worthwhile. Things like the stuff I did look really good on a college application and it gives you something to write about and it really separates you from all the other applicants. I applied to colleges all over again and got into some much better schools.

Anyway, I hope this helps. PM me if you want to know any more info.
 
I took a year off and think it was a great decision, it let me work and realise that I do want to go to uni and get a degree etc, plus you do come into it with more maturity and that helps. If i didnt work for a year I would have been hurting for cash to, and I went in comfortable and that also helped with the stress and unexpected expenses of a first year.
 
do it. taking a year off was the best thing i ever did.

i did more ool shit in the 1 yr between high school & uni than i ever did in the rest of my life put together.

when i finished highschool , iknew i wasnt ready for uni cosi couldnt handle studying any more. so i worked my arse off, ernt skiing then went overseas.

then, if you take that experience with you to college, youd be more likely to get into the course of your choice cos life experience = $$$$$$$money in the admissions peoples eyes.

if it wasnt for taking a year off im pretty sure id juast be miserable doing some bullshit science degree
 
i went 3 semester now im going to take a year or two of just to ski. If you dont know what you wanna do you should consider not going at first. even 2 years of liberal arts stuff flies by. but daaaaamn college is so much fun.
 
Just go travel, I learned 100x more from travelling/working around the world the last years then school.

- Australia/NZ is great for backpacking.

- Do some internship stuff in diving in some exotic place, I might be able to hook you up with that if you're interested.

- Be a ski bum!

- Have a look at www.gvi.co.uk they have some nice expeditions you can join for up to 15 weeks (aint cheap)

 
Fuck around for a year, I wish I had... establish residence, earn money, travel... whatever you want. The health insurance thing does kind of suck though... make sure you get a job with benefits if you're going to do it.
 
I went to school right after high school, and I am now done first year and still have no clue what I want to do with my life...

I should have taken a year off, so I would advise you to do it. It's also a good way to get used to living away from home on your own, assuming you are going away to college.
 
do it yo....im in school and i wish i could go backpacking or something like that. Im in debt up to my ears, soo do it.
 
i've heard both ways. my parents won't let me take a year off and i can see their reasoning. also my boss says that taking a few years off before college and ski bumming it was a big mistake. she said it was really hard to get back into the swing of things and she really didn't want to go back to college
 
all these responses have been real helpful, if anyone else knows other programs like americorps please share....thanks for the ideas
 
i disagree. Its hard to focus on your studies knowing that you are in that small time period in your life when you can just travel around and be a ski bum. I went to school for 3 semesters got good grades but could have gotten better. now im working til fall moving out west and gunna ski every mother fucking day. Getting back into the swing of things? Unless you go to a prep school highschool doesnt really get you "swinging" for college. Maturarity, knowing what you really wanna do, and focus will get you good grades in college.
 
also, know that the years you spend in college will be some of the best of your life. you'd have a hard time finding someone to disagree with that i think.
 
yeah man my mom wants me to do that it looks good like for half the year she said i have to do stuff like go to rwanda to cure malaria and ish like that but she said the other half i can do whatever i want so yeah i think it looks good and itll be fun
 
I'm thinking about taking a year off to get a job, and figure out what I want to do. I don't think it's practical you go off to college and spend a ton of money, if you don't even know what you want to do, when you could earn some money, figure it out, and have some fun.
 
yea but the thing is you dont need to declare a major until your third semester at most 4 year schools and you dont need to at all in a 2 year school
 
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