OK, so most people of a certain age think of a gap year as the perfect opportunity to let off a certain amount of post-secondary education steam, usually somewhere far away from prying parents, but, thanks to modern technology, close enough to contact when the old bank account needs topping up.
Oh I'm on my Gap Yah DAHLING!
And who can blame them? When they were younger, that's what the majority of gap years were all about. But not so these days. What with the economy tanking all around us and graduate positions becoming scarcer and scarcer, those gap-year party people are fast becoming a rare breed. Instead, people are looking at their gap year as a time to invest in their future: they could be gaining work experience either close to home or abroad in positions that probably won't be paid ones - all in aid of being able to create the kind of CV that's going to attract the right sort of attention.
Or they could be working during their gap year to put a little money aside for the return to their studies And that's what one particular university student did, and did very well. You may have heard of her: Emma Watson, a.k.a. a certain Hermione Granger, was studying for her English degree at Brown University, in Massachusetts for a couple of years before being tempted back in front of the cameras to appear in "The Perks of Being A Wallflower", "The Bling Ring" and "Noah". Oh, and also a Harry Potter movie, as well. Bringing her income from that series to a very healthy £20million or so. Divide that by eight - the number of Potter movies and we can assume she's made herself somewhere around the region of two and a half million quid, plus however much the other films brought in.
Emma Watson
Not bad for a gap year.
But the big question is this: Emma's hotly tipped to star in the film version of "Fifty Shades of Grey" ... so does that mean there's another gap year in the offing? At this rate, she may never get her degree.
