Do you need a college education to become a writer?

Recently I wrote a blog about the long ridge writer's group, but something else has been on my mind recently, college writing courses. I am currently in college studying liberal arts. I've taken a few writing classes along the way and know that I have many more to take along the way, but do I need these classes? To go into my chosen profession I will, but to be an actual writer I will not. While my dream is to be a writer, I have chosen to go to school and study journalism. Both jobs involve writing, but I only need a degree for one. I don't believe you need to go to college to write a book, as long as you know enough about grammar and spelling and you have natural talent. There are lots of authors who didn't go to college, some of which have made their way to the best seller's list. The few college classes on writing that I did take only served to heighten my confidence. There was one class I took where the teacher had us read boring short stories instead of writing. I honestly don't think that class helped me at all. College writing classes may help some, but you don't have to attend them to write a book. It's easier now with self publishing.

Brandon Sanderson's lectures vs. my teacher's lectures

Sunday I found Brandon Sanderson's lectures on YouTube, and I've been watching a few of them. So far I've been finding them really interesting, and wishing he'd been my writing teacher in college. I actually took three writing classes in college, general writing one, two, and intro to fiction. General writing one and intro to fiction writing were taught by the same lady. Writing one went smoothly, I got praise for everything I wrote. I loved the class, or maybe I just loved getting praise for my writing. Every time she assigned us something she just approved mine with a glance at my notes and told me to get writing. It was an easy class, one that I excelled at. Then came the second writing class. It was taught by a man who thought we should already know enough about writing to write by ourselves. He gave us five writing assignments, telling us we could rewrite them for higher grades if we wanted to. I actually did rewrite one, I think I got a c or low b on one assignment so I rewrote it. Other than that, he just talked about his life for the entire class period. I didn't really enjoy the class, but I think he enjoyed reading my papers. I looked at things much differently than him, and he wrote on my papers that I made good points. When it came time to pick spring classes, I was so excited that intro to fiction writing had been added as a class to choose from. I choose the class as soon as I could, glad that it was offered as an online class. I was in the middle of moving and wouldn't be able to go to the school anymore. If I had known the class was mainly about reading I wouldn't have even bothered to take it. I was dirt poor, waiting for my financial aid to come in, and the teacher demanded me to get a book that I couldn't afford at the time. I told her my issue and she threw me out of the class. I had to appeal and get put back in the class. I couldn't believe this was the same teacher I'd had before. Seventy-five percent of the class was reading a book called micro-fiction. None of the stories were interesting, in fact, I wouldn't give that book to my worst enemy. When we finally got to write, she gave me poor marks because she didn't want to hear about werewolves. She said she found them boring. So I had to write other things. I got good grades on everything else I wrote, but this woman made me so angry that I considered giving up writing. I would have much rathered be in Brandon Sanderson's class, where he actually allowed his class to write.