For the longest time, people have been divided into two, opinionated categories.  One side being what is called “book smart”, which means that you are typically smarter in school and use your academic knowledge to go to college and obtain a career from that.  The other side is being “street smart”, which means you are experienced in different areas and can make difficult but effective decisions to help you in your environment which you can potentially use to start your own company with connections you’ve made.  The question is, which side is more valuable?  There are many people who side just for one side and claim that their side is the best to be.  In reality however, both sides are very essential depending on the circumstance.

 

If you are planning on going to college and getting a degree that could help you with your wanted career, being book smart would be a key asset in that situation because you would need to study and learn so that you could obtain your degree.  However, if you were street smart in this situation, it would be as helpful as being book smart because you don’t have the same learning comprehension as people who are book smart would have.  However, once you do receive your degree, being street smart could come as an asset as well when it comes to looking for companies to work for by finding people around who can help you find the best companies to work for.

 

If you didn’t go to college and strive to be a self-starting entrepreneur of your own business, being street smart could help as you have the ability to connect with people who can get you the different resources you need to build your company.  You also would have the ability to make effective decisions when it comes to making them later on.  If you were book smart however, your knowledge in academics would not help you as it would compared to being in college.  You would need to have the ability to finding connections with people and using that to build your desired company.

 

Some people possess both traits however.  They know how to use their connections to their advantage while also getting a degree to put it all together and find their desired career that they have been working for.  Though people have different opinions about which side is more valuable, it's important to respect people's abilities and natural talents that will eventually help them in things that they may come across in the future.  Song writers would use their street smarts to find different producers that can help them release their created music while a medical school student would use their smarts to get their Doctorate Degree so that they can become a doctor and work in the medical field.  Both sides may have their benefits and their flaws, but in the end, they can be used by many different people so that they can find what makes them happy using their talents and abilities to build their careers and their futures.