The University of Life

My younger son Sean, aged 20, recently announced that he is not intending to return to university after completing his first year. His longing is to return to Africa, where he spent six months of his travelling gap year helping teach in a rural school in Uganda.

Unlike his life at university, he had early nights there.going to sleep shortly after dark, as there were no lights or indeed any entertainment at all. At the school, sports day required selecting two banana trees close enough together to stretch a cross bar between them. A half-brick did for the shot put, and the other half sufficed for the discus. He succeeded in getting malaria and bilharzias, experienced white water rafting, canoeing, quad-biking and getting within an arm-stretch of gorillas in Rwanda. He has learned what it is to live on little dough balls and to cook goat, to negotiate border posts into 12 countries, and to navigate through teeming African cities, relying entirely on public transport and his wits. My greatest admiration is he can now sit comfortably on his heels for long periods of time.

I am so pleased he has experienced these deprivations as a contrast to the inevitable comfort of a middle class upbringing in England. I am pleased he can willingly turn his back on creature comforts in order to experience adventure. I am delighted he enjoyed the warmth and friendship of materially poor people.but who have a simple, rich enjoyment of life. But my sense of parental duty nags at me too, as I struggle to find the right words of wisdom to help give him direction. I cannot criticise his decision to drop out of university, having done the same myself. For me, the big wide world needed exploring and university seemed too confining and an unwelcome delay.

Not gaining a degree may well hinder his future career path. I know that he needs to learn and develop skills and competencies in some appropriate discipline. But having employed many people over the years, I am more convinced than ever that attitude, enthusiasm and integrity are the most valuable currency.

Many jobs are best performed with a large dose of common sense - a trait that fending for yourself in a strange country should nurture fully.