How these millennials are making 6 figures, pursuing their passions, and climbing the career ladder without college degrees

• More Americans are continuing to question the value of a college degree.
• Business Insider spoke to millennials who didn't finish college, and they said they're grateful for the lives they've created.
• Still, they acknowledged the financial struggles that accompany job hunting without a degree.

Mary Hannah Guyaux felt isolated when she chose to drop out of college.

She'd been diagnosed with epilepsy before graduating from high school in 2008. Guyaux, now 36, enrolled at Robert Morris University in Pennsylvania and tried to balance college and her medical condition. However, she decided it was in her best interest to drop out after one semester.

Looking back, Guyaux doesn't regret that decision. But it was a difficult one to make in the moment.

"My family very much wanted me to stay and make the effort to continue doing it," Guyaux told Business Insider. "It was definitely a big fork in the road in terms of choices, but I didn't feel like I was doing well or succeeding."

After dropping out, Guyaux worked as a waitress in West Virginia until the restaurant closed. She started cleaning houses, and she grew the gig into a housekeeping business with her friend, which she operated until the pandemic.

She is now entering her fifth year of work at a construction company. She makes in the mid-five figures, and she said she's grateful for the life she has built with her husband.

Still, she said, entering the job market without a college degree wasn't easy.

"It has been surprising how, even with five years of experience in the field that I'm in and 10 years of experience running a small business, four years of being in college would get my foot further in the door than any of that," Guyaux said. "And often I feel like my résumé just gets pushed to the side."

Guyaux is among the millennials born between 1981 and 1996 who graduated from high school or college during the Great Recession. They faced a difficult labor market, whether they had a college degree or not.

Rising student debt loads and the increasing number of jobs that no longer require a degree in recent years have, however, sparked a shift in the way younger Americans perceive the value of higher education. Recent polling also shows that the percentage of Americans who view college as important has hit a new low.

Business Insider spoke to millennials without college degrees who gained fulfillment in their careers. While some said they've encountered hiring roadblocks due to the absence of a college degree, they wouldn't have done anything differently.

Guyaux said that while she's not necessarily passionate about her construction job, she's passionate about the life that it has provided for her.

"I live a very fulfilled life. I'm very blessed and very grateful for the life that I get to live," she said. "I have a wonderful husband and great friends and some really silly dogs. And I would not make a different choice."

Navigating the job market without a college degree

Guyaux said that, despite being content with her employment, she would consider going back to school later in life. So would Audrey Serna, 33, who graduated from high school in 2010 and withdrew from college after two semesters.

Serna enrolled at Oglethorpe University in Atlanta but struggled to balance her schoolwork, social life, and part-time jobs. After she dropped out, she worked in the retail and restaurant industries, and she said she struggled to pay her bills and secure higher-paying jobs due to the lack of a college degree.

"I felt like a total failure," Serna told Business Insider. "In the back of my mind, I always had the motivation to get out of this trap, but I just didn't quite know how."

An added layer of stress for Serna was job hunting while pregnant, which she believes made employers hesitant to hire her. But knowing she had to financially support a child was a motivator for her, and she landed an entry-level payroll job in 2014, where she stayed until the pandemic. She was later recruited for her current role as a payroll operations manager, earning a six-figure salary.

"I tell my kids all the time, 'You don't have to go to college.' But if I had the opportunity to live a second life and I had the opportunity to go to school, then I would do it," Serna said. "I think that education obviously is important, and I totally believe that college doesn't define your worth, but I do think it can make things easier."

Data shows that amid changing perceptions on the value of a college degree, a higher education still pays off. The New York Federal Reserve wrote in an April blog post that the median worker with a college degree earned about $80,000 a year, compareed ot $47,000 for a worker with a high school diploma.

Raising a 7- and 11-year-old as a single mom, Serna doesn't have the time — or financial means — to go back to school right now, but she said she'd consider it down the road. Still, she said it's not required for a successful career.

"Never feel like because you didn't go to college, that you're less worthy or less than anybody else in the world, because that is just so far from the truth," Serna said.

A push to discover new passions

Dropping out of college was Edith Marie Gillespie-Lorenzo's key to finding her passion for farming.

Gillespie-Lorenzo, 35, graduated from high school in 2008 and dropped out of the University of Massachusetts-Boston after a year. She recalled feeling at the time that college was the only acceptable option, so she enrolled; however, she struggled to maintain her grades while working part-time as a legal assistant at a law firm.

After dropping out, Gillespie-Lorenzo said she wasn't making enough money at the law firm to support herself. She knew that she enjoyed being outside and working with her hands, so she began searching for farm jobs and ultimately landed a part-time position in a vegetable field. That's where her passion for farming and agriculture ignited. Since it was seasonal work, she secured a full-time position in customer service at a mutual fund company, where she remained for seven years.

In 2021, she quit to pursue farming full-time, now working as a farm coordinator at a nonprofit in Massachusetts.

"It's my favorite thing in the world, and I couldn't imagine doing anything else," Gillespie-Lorenzo said.

She makes in the mid-five-figures, and she acknowledged that the low pay is challenging. She also said that she encountered times in her career where the absence of a college degree was a barrier to getting a higher starting salary or promotion. But to Gillespie-Lorenzo, money is not the priority for her right now — it's doing a job that brings her happiness.

Some high schools across the country are beginning to prioritize students' passions over college admissions. Business Insider recently visited a high school in rural Wyoming, for example, that presents college as just one of the options students can pursue postgrad, and helps equip them with the tools they need to take the path that's best for them, whether it's college, the workforce, or the military.

Looking back, the only regret Gillespie-Lorenzo has is not dropping out of college sooner.

"The world is so gigantic, and there are so many weird jobs that exist that colleges didn't even begin to cover," she said. "Life is too short to do anything less than what you want to do."