Mid-30s here, and I'm with you completely. I remember when I was in school I was pretty bored with what was being taught, however a couple things (specifically database theory) got me revved up and I kinda took off on my own. Acing my classes without attending them because I was busy building the department's intranet (none of the professors knew what an Intranet was until I explained it to them).
I dropped out one year before completing my program. Which is kind of funny because it really wouldn't have taken any effort. Instead I was chomping at the bit to work on this new and exciting back-end web stuff, so I went and got a contract job with a small webshop who didn't really understand what I was doing either at first, but we did some great work and had some great success.
My profs were great because they realized I was on to something pretty nifty and tried to make it easy for me to pursue it. They also tried to learn some of the stuff I was learning (I was teaching them in a way). In the end I think both sides benefitted from it.
Okay funny, not sure you'll ever see this but, I just followed your profile to your site to linked in (curiousity thing).
I think we might have crossed paths once, I was the lead ITV engineer at TechTV doing an Interactive IO Portal for CableVision that Extend designed. Worked mainly with a woman dev who's name I can't remember right now.
I dropped out one year before completing my program. Which is kind of funny because it really wouldn't have taken any effort. Instead I was chomping at the bit to work on this new and exciting back-end web stuff, so I went and got a contract job with a small webshop who didn't really understand what I was doing either at first, but we did some great work and had some great success.
My profs were great because they realized I was on to something pretty nifty and tried to make it easy for me to pursue it. They also tried to learn some of the stuff I was learning (I was teaching them in a way). In the end I think both sides benefitted from it.