Angela Duckworth Quotes

You have to think about what you want to do. There is nothing to say that you should study from the age of 20 to 23. I learnt more on a film set at 17 than in the classroom.

Not everybody needs to go to university; they can get out and start working straight away.

Without there being some national strategy, it is difficult for educators to know what kinds of engineers or technicians to produce and for potential students to know what professions to study for.

In a very general way, our society has fallen out of love with the skilled trades. Part of the problem is a myriad of myths and misperceptions that surround the jobs themselves, but the biggest cause is our stubborn belief that a four-year degree is the best path for the most people.

From a young age I had a real sense of the world of work. This is what vocational education gives you.

Universities used to prepare young adults for the real world. I dare say the graduates today go in without a clue and graduate without a clue. It's time to acknowledge the college degree is not worth what it was in the past. Times are changing, and so is the way we prepare our youth to survive in a competitive world.

I always wanted to be a writer! But I wanted to do other things, too - be a psychologist, a librarian, et cetera. Now I've decided that reading fiction that features characters who are in those professions will do.

I didn't want to be an actress. It wasn't a dream. I didn't have any dreams at all.

Wisconsin is very proud of the career and technical college system that we have back home.

I did all sorts of jobs after drama school - working in a bar, as a teaching assistant. I probably learned as much from them as I did at drama school.

Vocational education programs have made a real difference in the lives of countless young people nationwide; they build self-confidence and leadership skills by allowing students to utilize their unique gifts and talents.

Sometimes I wonder if I would've been more successful if I wasn't acting and I concentrated on other things. But I love being on set. I love working with my 100 crew members.

I don't want only a career.

I was in college that first semester, and I was like, 'Wow, this isn't who I am. This isn't what I want to do.' I was like, 'Oh God, I'm going to have to go out and make something of myself, and I have no clue what that is.'

At school I was lazy. But I started working when I was 15, washing dishes at a local truck stop restaurant. I was really, really bored with school, and I wanted to get a job as fast as I could. School was just so easy. There was just no challenge to it.

'One Tree Hill' was a great learning opportunity for me, and I'm excited to go and apply that elsewhere and see where I end up.

I knew out of high school I didn't want to go to college. I knew what whatever I did wouldn't have anything to do with college.

That's another piece of advice: Don't go to college; follow your dreams. Unless you're a doctor - then go to college.

Some people are born gardeners, some are politicians. I was an actor. It took a great deal of pain before I figured that out. I didn't relate to most of it.

Most of the people that I went to school with - I went to secondary school - we were educated to go and work in the line at Ford's, and if we were lucky, technical skilled labor. I sort of rejected that, and thought I wanted to do something else.

There are two ways to look at how life works and how people find their paths. One way is you take your time and try different things out. The other is you settle in early. I was into cooking very early.

When I finished high school, I was 16, and in Argentina you have to choose a career right after high school. There is no such thing as a liberal arts education.

To find out what one is fitted to do, and to secure an opportunity to do it, is the key to happiness

We need to tell better stories of men and women who master a trade. We have to stop telling kids to blindly follow their passion and show them the opportunities that exist. That was the big, overarching message of 'Dirty Jobs.'

There's something about Warren Wilson. You can gain a lot of very important things and skills that you carry over into whatever you decide to do.