I’d vote for #1, with a side of, ”...learn as much useful stuff as you can on the side”.
Given the way our current society functions, a person who lacks a college graduation certificate is at a severe economical disadvantage; and a person who lacks the high school graduation certificate is practically economically crippled. Yes, world-saving skills are great, but they don’t pay the bills.
In addition, some colleges do indeed teach you important and useful skills, and thus getting into them and staying for 4-6 years is not a waste of time. Merely living in an academic environment can expand your horizons, exposing you to areas of study that it wouldn’t even occur to you to consider otherwise. On top of that, if your college major does match your interests, high-quality structured instruction will improve your skill level faster than you can accomplish on your own.
That said, typical high school workloads are usually fairly light, so I’d use the spare time to rack up some extracurricular activities (to improve your chances of getting into a good college), as well as to brush up on whatever it is you are actually interested in learning (because high school won’t teach you much of anything useful).
I’d vote for #1, with a side of, ”...learn as much useful stuff as you can on the side”.
Given the way our current society functions, a person who lacks a college graduation certificate is at a severe economical disadvantage; and a person who lacks the high school graduation certificate is practically economically crippled. Yes, world-saving skills are great, but they don’t pay the bills.
In addition, some colleges do indeed teach you important and useful skills, and thus getting into them and staying for 4-6 years is not a waste of time. Merely living in an academic environment can expand your horizons, exposing you to areas of study that it wouldn’t even occur to you to consider otherwise. On top of that, if your college major does match your interests, high-quality structured instruction will improve your skill level faster than you can accomplish on your own.
That said, typical high school workloads are usually fairly light, so I’d use the spare time to rack up some extracurricular activities (to improve your chances of getting into a good college), as well as to brush up on whatever it is you are actually interested in learning (because high school won’t teach you much of anything useful).