In this day and age, more and more gap-year takers have chosen to delay tertiary education for one year, to look for a job or immerse in a new culture. There are admittedly several benefits, I contend the negative influences of this practice are more glaring.
On the one hand, having a year-long break may indeed have some benefits. Firstly, immersing in an alien culture helps students enrich life experience. It is because school-leavers may adapt quickly to independent life, especially when they have to get by without taking care of their parents, which makes them become a true citizen. In addition, when new high school graduates study abroad, they will see life through nen lens. Let’s imagine that if you expose a new culture, you may feel interested in acquiring knowledge such as customs, styles and traditions from a exotic country. As a result, immersing in a exotic culture helps you become a more well-rounded person. Not only do you travel abroad, you can also enter the workforce that helps you identify a suitable career path. In Vietnam, most high schools have inadequate career guidance at high school, so students may have no ideas which major to pursue. Moreover, if students try different roles and tasks, they can easily discover their true strengths and interests. From that, they can cultivate relevant job skills and strengthen some necessary skills such as interpersonal skills, teamwork and time-management skills.
However, aforementioned benefits, I strongly believe that there are more drawbacks for gap-year takers to overcome. Although it is true that new high school graduates can gain a lot of experience when choosing to defer university enrollment, this also leads to deterioration in their academic progress. Specifically, they may lose momentum and find it hard to resume education because of being away from school for a long time. Besides, if they can not adapt to coursework and pace of college, they may fall behind their peers or face pressure. For instance, I have a brother who delayed tertiary education for a year and now he is getting into trouble adapting to the pace of university. As a result, he fell behind his peers. Also, school-leavers can struggle with financial difficulties for the reason that if you choose to have a year-long break by immersing in an alien culture, you will face exorbitantly expensive fees, which put high pressure on your family. Evenly, you can get by in massive debt.
In conclusion, considering benefits, shortcomings of deferring university enrollment in terms of academic performance adversely affected or facing massive debt, I contend not worthwhile path.