Okay, the benefits of college. I also have a segment in this where we talk about, if you do not want to go to college, there are other things that you can do. It’s not that 100% of us have to go to college, that’s not how this world works. But for those of you who are thinking that college is a good choice for you, this is important information. Degrees give options. I think you all know that.

Two people, Jimmy is my cousin’s husband and Jimmy went to high school and then he got out of high school and started working for Pennzoil and he was selling oil and car things, whatever Pennzoil sells to different auto shops. And he liked doing that. But he always had wanted to be a pilot. So what Jimmy did is he started paying for the hours and the certifications that you need in order to become a commercial pilot. So there he was paying for all of that. He was knocking down doors trying to get a job, very, very difficult because nobody – no commercial airlines will hire you without college and/or military.

Dillon. Dillon went to high school with my son, he graduated in 2011. Dillon worked hard all through high school, got himself accepted to UCLA and who do you think is paying for UCLA? Military. The United States Navy. Dillon is going to be a naval pilot. So he graduates from UCLA with a four-year degree which automatically opens a lot of doors for him, whether he decides to pursue flying or not. Then he has six years in the Navy at which time he will be taught how to fly every type of aircraft. And he’s not paying for it. He’s getting a salary and he’s being taken care of basically. Yes, he’s learning how to fly. So he gets out of four years of college, six years of the military knowing how to fly everything.

So here is the scenario: Here’s Jimmy: Jimmy basically begged to get a job with a commercial airfreight company. He got in because he went there every Monday and sat there with his resume and an application in hand. They escorted him off the premises twice by security just to get rid of him. He wouldn’t go. He came back the next Monday. So finally, to get rid of him, they hired him. It worked out for him. But Jimmy was so happy to be hired that he probably would’ve paid them. So this is where Jimmy started at his salary as a pilot.

Here comes Dillon out of four years of college and six years of flying in the military. Dillon is going to get a starting salary up here. So pilots have negotiated raises. So let’s say it’s a 5% raise. Here’s Jimmy’s 5% raise and here’s Dillon’s 5% raise. You’re all going to sock money away for your future, for your kid’s college, so you’re going to earn interest. Here’s Jimmy’s interest, here’s Dillon’s interest. When it comes time, your company will – you put away money for your retirement because we all want to have something left when we stop working. So you put in money for your retirement and then the company, depending on who you will work with, will kick in some. So here’s Jimmy’s and here’s Dillon’s. Is this gap ever going to close? Absolutely not. It’s really not. Jimmy has run the numbers. He has figured that it has cost him $5 million not to go to college at the salary that he is. So if you want to go to college it’s a really, really good idea.

Don’t let things stand in your way. College is available to all. Life is not fair, make it work for you. How many in here play a sport? Awesome. How many in here are in drama, the arts, music? Good, fantastic. Do you know my son was – of course you wouldn’t know that – but anyway, my son was an awesome football player in high school. He was a kicker. And in his sophomore year he was the sixth-leading scorer on the team. He was MVP special teams, he was second-team all league. He had colleges sending him letters of interest. Cal, LSU, Oregon and Wisconsin sent letters to my son. Do you know, as a football player, what GPA he would have needed to have gotten into any one of those Division I colleges? What GPA do you think he would’ve needed? As an athlete, and an athlete who brings something to the table that that school wants, he could’ve gotten into any of those schools with a 2.5. Full ride scholarship. Life’s not fair. Make it work for you.

If you’re in drama, the arts, music, also these things are available to you as well. Schools have money for these things. If they want what you bring to the table, there are scholarships available. My son has a learning disability. Most colleges have accommodations that are available. Stanford has a huge program for dyslexics. Absolutely huge. As does Arizona State or University of Arizona, one of them, I’m not sure which. Kahn Academy. How many of you have heard of Kahn Academy? Kahn Academy is, if you need a tutor but either don’t want to spend the money, can’t afford it, Kahn Academy is 24×7. If you are doing homework at night – what math are you guys in? Algebra two. Trigonometry, my gosh. I don’t know how you do it, math is not my friend, but that’s okay, I do know how to balance a checkbook and that’s really – we’ll say that’s good for now. Anyway, if you are doing an algebra two problem at night and there is nobody that you can call if you are stuck on that problem, go to – you are going to have to Google Kahn Academy. If you do www.kahnacademy.org. You’re going to go to some bootleg site. I don’t know what happened but anyway, just Google Kahn Academy and click on the link and make sure that it looks like this. This is the homepage for Khan Academy. And basically you just click on the menus as far as you want math, you want algebra two, and they will give you the different types of problems. You just click on that. And they’ve got a blackboard where they tell you, they show you and they tell you how to do each problem. They’ve got history on this, English, art history. They’ve got so many subjects on this. So check it out. Kahn Academy is absolutely wonderful, does not cost a cent. So if you ever say, well, it’s not going to work for me because I don’t have a tutor. Yes you do. It’s through Kahn Academy.

So cost for colleges. Who here has heard of the University of San Francisco? Most of you. Hastings Law College? Does anyone here want to be a lawyer? Hastings College is at the University of San Francisco. It’s one of the leading law schools in the nation. And they have what’s called a legal education opportunity program. LEOP. Which is where 20% of the student body every year – they don’t pay a dime for their legal education. Whether it takes two years or three years. Their tuition is covered, their dorms are covered, their books are covered. They also get specialized tutoring before tests, they get special help on how to lead a business meeting, how to conduct a meeting. Hastings Law School is not the only college that has this available too. There are a lot of colleges that have learning opportunity programs. Also, don’t discount community colleges.

We were going to go back to athletes. Do you know that there are 126,000 NCAA scholarships every year? That’s a lot. Because you guys look like football players. We’ve got some athletes in here. I’m sure that someone is saying, oh yeah, you’re good but there are so few scholarships. There are 126,000 a year. And that’s for Division I and Division II colleges. There are more for Division III. So don’t let people try to dampen your enthusiasm for what you want to do in life. You just have to keep going for it.