I'm just coming to the end of my degree, but something that amazed me was just how many of my school friends changed their degrees in the first year, or dropped out of university all together. I think it must have been nearly 50% of my friends changed significantly what they were doing within the first year, many within the first semester.

My brother has also just started university and he told me he's seen exactly the same thing. Of the 9 close friends that went off to university at the same time as him, only 2 are still on their courses. A few dropped out, most changed courses but won't be able to start the new courses until the next academic year.

Very few people know what they want to do at 18, and many don't know what studying their chosen subject will really be like.

I was really surprised by this because I knew what course I wanted to do at university when I was 13, I thought it was Electronic Engineering, until I found out that Computer Science existed, at which point I immediately recognised that as what I wanted to do. I assumed everyone was like that, but I have friends who at 21-23 are still trying to work out what they want to do.