Barbara Bush---College Dropout?

First I want to convey my deepest sympathies to all the Bush supporters, of which I am one, for the passing of Barbara Bush. I always admired Mrs. Bush and thought she made a great first lady and matriarch of what can be considered a modern day political dynasty. Love the Bushes or hate them, no matter, you can't deny that she was key in assisting George H.W. and George W. into winning their respective presidencies. But that's for another discussion.

My reason for this post is regarding Mrs. Bush and her college career. Evidently she "dropped out" of Smith College to marry George and start a family and advance his political career. The local news networks here in Houston have repeated this multiple times. At least Wikipedia was more diplomatic and used the term "discontinued studies". She eventually was honored with an honorary doctorate from Smith. She also gave the commencement at Wellesley College in 1990, even though many students protested, since they felt she hadn't achieved what they had as graduates.

So the questions are: Should we continue to look at her as a dropout that just happened to be fortunate to get an honorary doctorate by circumstances? Did she finish college by receiving the honorary doctorate? Are reporters out of line by referring to her as a college dropout?

 

Mrs. Bush was a lady of great accomplishments. In view of this alone, she does not deserve a potentially pejorative label like 'College dropout.' By the same token, Neither does Bill Gates, whose accomplishments span the computer industry and philanthropy. He found it necessary to leave Harvard to tend to his fast-growing business. Yeah - that one. Microsoft.
Shame on the labelers. Have they nothing better to do than slag those whose accomplishments are far greater than their own? If someone needs to refer to the fact, "discontinued studies" or something similar is the way to go.