Autodidacts/Self-Directed Education

[Bibby]

You can achieve great things with self-study. I've passed 14 CLEPs, using nothing but self-study. Many of you can share similar stories. If you possess ample curiosity and a healthy amount of self-discipline, you can vastly expand your knowledge by studying on your own.

But there are also some things where there's no substitute for the knowledge and experience of a good teacher or mentor. For most people, it's hard to learn how to do math, science, or programming without a helping hand. Even exceptionally gifted individuals like Bill Gates had lots of people helping him along the way. For me, formal education is most valuable when it's used to facilitate things that are hard to learn on your own.