Hall and Lieber emphasize that students must have a mapped out plan about what they want to do and what they want to gain from their experience. Taking time off is not about bumming around. There is a intellectual component to this endeavor that parents may tend to dismiss. They shouldn't.
Finally, a book that challenges the idea that all people between the ages of 18-22 should go to immediately to college without entertaining the possibility of alternative experiences that would serve them better, at least temporariliy. There is no doubt that young men and women should obtain their college degrees, according to Hall and Lieber... the question simply is when.
KUDOS!!