Point: Not having a degree can be limiting

Throughout high school I saw college as something that I had to do, as opposed to something I actually wanted to do.

After my first year of college, I took a year off, thinking I could join the "real world" without worrying about a college degree. This was much to my mother's dismay, of course.

By leaving college, I thought I was escaping the rules of corporate America, but I learned that no matter what job you work, you still have to play by those rules. Not having a college degree limits your chances—even of getting a bottom level job.

My aunt, who is a Vice President stock administrator for a large computer company, said her department will no longer hire secretaries without college degrees.

Not to mention that I experienced firsthand how people who don't have college degrees are treated. Even my own grandfather called me a "ski bum" to my face.

The problem is when people depend on having a college degree alone to land them a job in the future. The assumption that X purchased degree leads to Y comfortable job is not really the case anymore.

Research has not been convincing in proving that a college degree is worth it with the economy where it is now. But the economy will not always stay the way it is.

One positive statistic is that 7city Learning, a financial-services training company, recently found that 75 percent of Wall Street firms plan to hire more recent graduates this year than they did last year due to the slight improvement in the economy.

Probably not many college graduates are working at the job they dreamed they would be at after graduating school, but the point is that they have a chance of getting that well-paying job that opens up in the future.

Along with a degree to put on their resume, college also offers students the chance to start meeting people in their field through classes, on-campus jobs, or internships. Some statistics indicate that around 50 percent of jobs are gotten through connections alone.

It's also possible that I'm just trying to convince myself that my $20,000 loan from my first year of college wasn't the biggest waste of money ever.