To the second question...
I wish I had worked for 4 or 5 years, and then gone to college. Seems like we jump into higher education too quickly. If I'd waited, I'd probably gone to school for forestry or horticulture, and paid a lot less for my liberal arts degree. I don't regret school or my degree at all. Studying the liberal arts is valuable, even if you don't "use" your degree in your job. I just wish I'd been old enough/mature enough to fully appreciate it while I was in it, and had enough perspective to focus my studies in a direction that would have helped my career. Not to sound ungrateful for getting to go to college - it was a blessing! I'm speaking about an "ideal world" of course, where in reality, we only have so much time in this life, after all...
A lot of the students that work for me on the campus where I work seem to be in a similar predicament. They spend 3 years trying to figure out what they want to major in, and decide at the last minute without much counsel or without much perspective on how that will help them develop a career. One guy that works for me loves working on the grounds, and will probably end up in the green industry - maybe even arboriculture - but he'll leave college with a degree that has no bearing on that field, and only a federal work study employment with a college grounds department to put on his resume. Not the best foot to start on, even though he's a skilled, hard working, valuable employee and would be an asset to any company.
Maybe that's just life, though...
My 2 pennies...
