I want to take a gap year before I go to college” are some of the most feared words by parents. What do we fear? We fear they won’t want to go back to school after being off for a year. We fear they will lie around the house, watch TV and play video games. We fear they aren’t thinking clearly and have no idea what they are saying. And for those competitive parents, it’s not what they planned.

Don’t fear the gap year. Not every student is ready for college after high school. Some simply aren’t mature enough, and others simply don’t know where they want to go or what they want to study. And if this is the case, would you want to spend thousands of dollars on college if it meant they dropped out their first semester? Of course you wouldn’t want to do that.