>Autodidacticism can lead to new perspectives on projects, and allows people to focus on things that are important, but not emphasized in most colleges.

It also allows people to veer into becoming cranks, without appropriate teachers to guide you along the way. As long as we're exchanging anecdotes, in my undergrad I've met my fair share of "physics autodidacts" who seem to believe they've "solved" massive problems related to engineering/physics.