When I took classes such as these my freshman year, I initially thought college was a joke. It wasn't until I got more into the classes required for my major that I began to take college seriously and feel as if I was actually learning and gaining valuable skills.
Additionally, many of these classes are rather useless since they probably have absolutely nothing to do with one's major. One example is the dreaded MATH 101. As a journalism major, I am never going to need to know the Pythagorean Theorem or the quadratic formula in order to write or edit a column effectively.
While some math classes dealing with financial planning could be useful, many of these skills can be learned through life experience. For the most part, students should be able to focus solely on their major during their time at college.
The fact is that most students don't approach these courses with the same sort of devotion as they do with classes they see as being useful. Professors, however, tend to teach the material as if everyone taking the class is planning on majoring in the subject. As a result, many students' grades suffer, sometimes to the point of lowering their grade point averages so much that they are unable to get into the major they planned on pursuing.