I'm 19 and have been a hobbyist programmer since I was a freshman in high school (2002). I recently graduated in May of '08. Right out of high school I had my first job programming contract work for a company (got noticed off of my personal website). Originally the CEO and I had discussed working for about a year from home before going out there, as recently graduated, no previous jobs, no money, and them wanting me to move across the United States, after 6 weeks of work and two projects I made my decision to stay with my family because my father might lose his job, and with my sister and mother trying to finish college I want to be here to help out in case things get real rough. - Contract work stopped there, which was fine with me, I expected it.During my time working for them I learned at a rapid rate, and I was very eager and happy to work well over 12 hours a day to get whatever they threw at me done. I worked directly under a senior developer, whose a friend of mine and they seemed to like my work and that I was doing a good job. Working for them as a whole was very good, professional, and  very comfortable.I've always thought that school is a joke and doesn't really prove anything (my high school grades show it, minus all the technology classes I aced) - But I always feel that I don't truly know enough to secure a good programming job. Visual Basic .NET, C#, WinForms, sockets, are some of my skills.., but I am very modest about what I know, because there is just so much I need to learn.Question is.. how valuable can college really be? How can I really polish my skills up and fill in the holes of knowledge I may be missing? How can I really find out what I need to focus on, and where to go next?I find myself overwhelmed a lot of the time because I try to run a software development website, many projects, as well as helping other programmers who know much less than me, and of course personal life, its all very frustrating. I have many directions to go, but I'm paralyzed in which way to pick..I've read many topics on this already here, and on the net, but I'm young still and it feels like a lot of it doesn't apply to me.
Am I too young to be worrying about college right now?
career development;education;employment