Do you need really a college education?
Yes and no. Most things that college will teach you, you can learn on your own with hands on experience if the company truly cared enough to do so. I do think there are certain specialty careers where college education makes sense and is required, though.
Look at firefighting, for them it's 50/50. It's not the exact same thing, but my point is, there are a lot of departments that will let you come in with zero experience, zero knowledge and zero training, and they will train you! In fact, some will even pay for you to go to a fire school. College degrees are just like high school diplomas, pointless. They are wall decorations that you can show off.