Wil - I know you wrote this sometime ago, but after reading it, I am compelled to respond. I teach high school and with a minority of my students (10 - 20%) they have this sense of entitlement. They think that their friends will "hook them up" with a house, a car, and their lives will be as easy as they find them now. I run the risk of displaying a "getoffmylawn" attitude, but I truly don't remember thinking this way that I felt I was due all of these things. I blame myself for not taking advantage of the opportunities that were in front of me (i.e. not applying for scholarships so I wouldn't have to work full time for my college degrees), but I didn't think the world owed me anything. What aggravates me as a teacher is I really try to teach them these life lessons. However, I think I'm becoming as irrelevant as the adults in my teenage world were to me. I wished I listened to them more closely and I wish my students would listen to me know. I guess experience is the best teacher, but I don't want to hear the whining when I tried to get them the skills toward a better paying job than mine. PB