|I came from AskReddit in the latest wave approximately 40 days ago. Me too! :)
You've got a life full of-- well, life! I aspire to enter investment banking, and I once had a meeting with the PM (leader, basically) of a $2 billion hedgefund in NYC. I told him about all my ambitions and plans, and after a few minutes of me spilling my dreams, he cut me off. And he said "Stop looking ahead. Stop planning. Figure yourself out first. Find your interests, all your interests, and act on them. All of them. Fail at all of them, I don't care. But know that you did them, and go as far as you can in everything that you can. In that way, you will end up where you need to be." Always keep that with me now, and I find myself branching out to interests and activites I never thought I'd be involved in :)
Wow, that's a pretty inspirational quote. I have found that many people get it embedded in their minds that they want to go into a specific career when they hardly know themselves yet. I feel like this is why so many students enter college, then change their degree.
I agree, and being personally in the process now I find that it's quite near impossible to break away from the beaten path that private and public schools alike direct us to. It's insensible for someone who has experienced so little (relative to how much there really is to experience) to be able to decide what they want to dedicate themselves to.
I've spoken with a woman who grew up in Germany. It's policy there to take a test at the age of twelve to determine what field of work you will go into. Score high on the test, be educated to have a high paying job that works with science/math. Score low and become educated in crafts of the hand, which tend to pay lower. It's crazy that your life is heavily influenced from such an early age there.
Why not? Edit: I misread, I thought you said it isn't a good thing that international students are coming.