Problem-solving skills...or lack thereof

I work with a lot of young people.  I am 37 (I know, so ancient, right?), and most of the people I work with are in their early-twenties, so for a lot of them, this is their first "real" job out of college.  Ugh, I remember those days of greenness and the 30-somethings would roll their eyes because of some alleged faux-pas I committed.  Whatever.  I try not to be that way.  I don't roll my eyes, no.  But I do get pissed off.   Not at little things, like an honest data entry error or not remembering how to do something (unless I've already told you like four times).  It's when people don't put on their thinking caps and TRY to figure things out, even simple things, for themselves.  It's like they need to be told everything, what to do, and how to do it.  Am I your mother?  Do you need to have your hand held to cross the street?  Should I change your diaper?  I do need the practice, after all, if I intend on becoming a mother.  I have the perfect example of what I'm talking about.  True story:

A letter needed to be mailed out, so I put the envelope, ready to go (all it needed was a stamp), on the 20-something's desk.  I put a post-it note on it that said, "Please stamp and mail out today."  I found the letter back on my desk a few days later, not even the next day, with a new post-it note on it that said, "We don't have any stamps."  Uh.  Okay.  WHAT????  You have GOT to be kidding me, right?  I'm the type of person that can't hide her feelings well, even on paper, so I wrote in the angriest of letters, "If there are no stamps, then GO TO THE POST OFFICE AND GET SOME."  Here's a newsflash for you: you're the receptionist--that's your JOB!

See, this is what I'm talking about.  I had to tell her what to do.  Okay, maybe I yelled at her on paper.  I probably could have been nicer about it, but I was pissed.  You left this letter on my desk for three days because there weren't any stamps in the office??  Come on.  Any 30- or 40-something would have known to go to the post office, wouldn't they?  And don't get me wrong, it's not because she's dumb.  She is FAR from dumb; in fact, she's very bright and picks up things very quickly.  But unfortunately, she is cursed with what most of her generation is cursed with: no problem-solving skills.  I don't know what's changed in the curriculum since I graduated, but clearly our colleges and universities need to institute some sort of class that teaches the ability to think outside the box, or better yet, to just THINK, period.  Or maybe a class in pure common sense might be good for everyone.