I am the product of a mixed education. Until the middle of junior high, I was educated in a fairly exclusive American school for expatriate kids in South Asia. I went to school with the (corrupt) president's son, and that country's equivalent of the U.S. robber baron families, plus a bunch of diplomats' kids. When I returned to my own country (Australia), I went to a private school, where my inability to follow rules and be force-fed Christianity led to my quasi-expulsion (they invited me to withdraw from the school). From there I went to a state school where things ran quite differently. The onus was on us to do our work... if you didn't do it, the teachers didn't care, your grades would suck but that was on you. It was like being thrown out of a boat and forced to swim to shore. It taught me to be able to function on my own, without a boss telling me what to do. Weirdly, it was good preparation for what I do now.