I know someone who started uni at 24, after 7 year of working as line cook then chef. She seems to have the opposite experience that you have. She has had a lot of support from the professors in her first year, and only wanted to reach bachelor. Then the seocnd year came, she started to really understand biology, and changed her goals from nutrition to pharmaco/biochemistry, changing her courses with the help of the admin. Then in Master 1, she once again pivoted towards genetics (therapeutic engineering to be exact), and it seems her M2 will push her toward a doctorate in genetics and anthropology, which is yet another pivot.
For myself uni wasn't a success, and maybe we whould require children to work before getting to uni if they don't know what they wat to do yet, but at least for some, Uni is great and function exactly as it should.
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