The difference is regardless of whether you directly use what you learned in college or not, you have gained experience and tools that will help you in your future endeavors.

I read this sort of thing as: Forget what you were taught because we’re going to reshape you to help you succeed in this position, but DON’T forget how you learned, what tools and concepts you used along the way, connections built, etc.

You have to understand the core building blocks you became familiar with still apply one way or another. All of that hardship helped you build experience and understanding which enabled you to enter the industry of your choice and get a job where they start to mold you in a way that benefits the work you were hired to do.

If you don’t go to college you didn’t have all of those building blocks from approved curriculums and standardized testing, in person labs, team projects, etc.

You can achieve without college no question but that usually means the job will need to do potentially even more molding to get a person to a similar spot. Not always but much of the time.