Just something interesting from R Aharon Lichtenstein’s levaya (that I’m sure most of you won’t agree with but that I think is still more than worth saying).
For context, R Aharon was not only a gadol baTorah, but rather also a PhD in English literature from Harvard.
The last maspid said that many people spoke of R Aharon as someone who was mattir. He was mattir reading secular books, he was mattir secular studies, etc. But no, this was not the case- he wasn’t mattir anything. As someone who spent his entire life in pursuit of excellence in avodat HaShem, he regarded everything we do as something in pursuit of that goal. If you believe in using the whole world (laHashem haaretz umelo’ah) in order to work on your avodat HaShem , then it’s more than just “something the Rav was mattir” but rather a chova. If it is not lesheim Shamayim and entirely for the sake of growing in avodat HaShem, by that token it would be assur.
I know that most of the population of the CR will probably disagree with most of the premise here, but I’m mentioning it here because it’s a fascinating perspective to have even for those with a more charedi, kulo Torah perspective. A lot of what this thread is arguing about is college as a bedieved and as a necessary evil, or about work as though it is not optimal. Even so, though, we can’t just divide these aspects of life into ikkar and tafel. We can’t just blow off the rest of life as though it’s valueless. Everything we do needs to be viewed through a lens of “is this helping me in my avodat HaShem? Is this giving me a new understanding of HaShem’s world and wisdom?” Even if it’s not the first choice way to spend your time, we need to be aware of the ways in which we need to bring HaShem into every aspect of our lives, even college.