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"As much as we profess behavioral objectives that stress 'maturity,' there is evidence that when students exhibit this quality some members of the faculty are threatened rather than thrilled. This is more common when the learner comes into a curriculum with obvious and documented mature behaviors. Perhaps our labeling of older, responsible, family-rearing, and previous-degree-holding students as nontraditional may betray some faculty attitudes that compel our further consideration." —Archer, 1995, p. 65
As with many "minority" groups, the very term we use to designate older students betrays a kind of discomfort with them as "non-standard" students who may upset the balance of power in our classroom. In fact, when asked, nontraditional students always cite intimidation of the TA or the professor as a possible irritant in smooth classroom relations. When faced with an intimidated teacher, nontraditional students may feel as if they are not allowed to participate equally in the classroom because their insights do not fit preconceived notions of the material to be covered. They feel "under-used" in the sense that their extra experience could be an asset to a classroom, but becomes a liability when the teacher refuses to acknowledge their perspective as equally valid as the perspective of more traditional students.
The "difference" that nontraditional students exhibit and experience comes directly from the kinds of experience that the other students (and perhaps the teacher) cannot share. They are older, and may be dealing with children, mortgages, jobs, marriages or divorces while they study for a degree. Nontraditional students thus have greater demands on their time and attention than the average undergraduate.
Because of the wider experience they have of life, nontraditional students bring a different perspective to the classroom. They may see class topics and material from unusual angles, and introduce unexpected opinions and insights into class discussion. Nontraditional students often feel excluded or singled out because no one in the classroom seems quite able to explain why they are there, neither students nor the teacher. In each new class, therefore, they must reintroduce and re-explain their position to the class in the hopes of making the other students and the teacher more comfortable with their presence. They seem to agree that once they explain their presence, the other students seem curious and interested in them rather than nervous about their presence.
Nontraditional students may also have to struggle to share the student experience that seems to come naturally to younger, traditional students. As one nontraditional student put it, "When I first came, I thought 'How can I do this? They're all younger than me. They're all smarter than me. I'm not going to fit in.'" Older students have no recent training in study habits or classroom styles, and are faced with learning (or relearning) the academic culture while juggling all of their other responsibilities. Perhaps even more than freshmen just starting out at UNC, the prospect of starting classes at such a large institution which has the reputation of being only for the best students is intimidating to a student coming back later in life.
The greatest asset nontraditional
students bring to the classroom, apart from their life experience, is their
willingness to work hard and to "go the extra mile." Nontraditional
students are back in school with clear goals and reasons for being there. They
are often unusually active and thoughtful participants in class. They can be
a source not only of extra insights and information, but also of enthusiasm
for a class, and they ask nothing more than teachers use their particular type
of diversity to the class's advantage.
Quotes from interviews with nontraditional students on campus
"When I started school, I was 20, so I wasn't all that much older than the other students. But when I started it was kind of a shock to me to discover that even that was a difference from the younger students who start out when they're 18, 19- I was actually working, so I had to wear a suit to class. I guess that made me look older. At one point, I remember I was at a student get-together. I was talking to a classmate. She was being very friendly and very nice and all of a sudden she said how it was very neat to have the perspective of someone who was so much older. I just thought, 'Oh yeah, I'm two or three years older than you maybe.' "
"A nontraditional student could be 24, or 40. So there's a diversity within nontraditional students."
"If you've been out of high school for 3 years, and you come to the university, you're considered a nontraditional student. You have to go through the continuing education before you get started."
"Some of the students were so well prepared for college already. For example, when I had a Shakespeare class, well, I hadn't had Shakespeare since when I was in high school, and that's a long, long, long time ago. These students had just had it last year or the year before. So I had to work harder at it. Their backgrounds were actually stronger than mine because they were more recent. It also may be related to a style of teaching, that the other students because they'd been at UNC longer had grasped, and I was new as a transfer student, so I didn't know it."
"When I first got here, I was intimidated. When I first got into those classes and I saw those students that were so prepared. I think a freshman would have the same intimidation factor. It's a question of coming to UNC cause it's big. The intellectual atmosphere here is so different."
"My whole experience at Carolina in the classes was positive. Maybe it was because I was so happy to be here, I really wanted to be here, I was ready for it."
"We have a lot of living experience, but you have to realize that people who are coming back to college don't have that same academic or intellectual experience of other students. They're bound to have more book knowledge and we haven't. We're undergraduates, and that's what we're back for: all that learning. You can't be intimidated by our ages and our living and learning styles. I think that's good: we bring a lot into the classroom. We look at things differently and see different perspectives. "
"When you're reading literature there's a depth there that you can feel that young people can't feel about different characters. You may have been in a similar situation as the characters. You can more easily identify with a character."
"It was a feeling of being rather put out in front of the crowd, because a lot of the times in the classroom [the TA] will mention something like, 'Well you guys don't remember that,' which does kind of put you off because you're sitting there thinking 'Well, I am older than you probably.' In a lot of cases, I'm a lot older than the TA. It's one of those things where you get sort of alienated."
"The professor said 'You kids don't remember that' and there was another woman in the class who was my age and we looked at each other and thought 'Well, yeah we do.' "
"I've never been singled out in the negative sense but there is an age-related separation from the group.
"Yeah, I agree, I think the student body are a little more apt to want to talk to you. It's mainly the instructors who make you feel different.
"I've been going to school for a lifetime it seems. Somewhere along the line, I realized I was feeling not isolated, but somehow set apart from the classroom community. So I made it a point to always just introduce myself to the students around me in the class. I find this [need to take the initiative is] typical of an older student. Today I had this experience: We were divided into groups, and we got there and no one wants to talk. No one wants to say 'OK, this is the project, how are we going to divide it up?' I was able to get that part going, and ask them about things, but then they do not ask me in return. I used to sort of wait, thinking it would be reciprocal. Now I just say, 'Well I'm doing such and such.' "
"I think it's just because they're shy- I have kids that age. I don't know if it's intimidation or what, but they feel something. They look at you funny. "Are you from another planet or what are you doing in here?" But it's not really unkind or negative, but sort of inquisitive. You don't fit the mold. 'Who are you and why are you here?' But they don't quite dare to ask."
"In my best classes, I was just included in the whole class. It was just like I was another student, I was expected to do the same work as the other students. Because I was older, there was still no difference made. I was treated just like everyone else. "
"[The other students] reacted to me differently. You're not included in their activities all the time, not that you necessarily want to be. I think they looked at me like their Mom."
"Nontraditional students don't have any social organizations to belong to. But if you have children and a job, it's hard to take on that social aspect. You're almost here just for business."
"In my instance, it's working through school. I don't have as much time. A lot of professors just don't see that. In general most of them are used to kids where their parents are paying their bills and they have the spare time. They can go to study sessions at 3:00 in the afternoon. I have to totally rearrange my schedule to try and be there for this. They don't seem to accommodate that very much. It's the little things, where it's a little harder, You have to really want to go back to school because it seems like if you don't really want it, you're fighting against the wind. It's easy to give up."
"Yes, I also found that clearly, you have to want to do this. The TAs and professors don't help much. I just don't fit into anybody's world. I take it as my responsibility to go and explain to them, but sometimes I get tired of doing it. One time last year, I spent a week going from one professor's office to another because I didn't fit into anybody's little box. Somebody in this department should surely know how to direct me. There seemed to be a lack of direction sometimes. The instructors themselves are not instructed on how to do anything with nontraditional students."
"I feel like the university doesn't really accommodate nontraditional students all that well. Just the bureaucracy of it all makes it a little bit harder for you to go back to school. It's not an easy process."
"I thought a lot of professors were really helpful. I did have trouble with the administration once. I had two pregnancies while I was in school, and there are no policies for that. You have to drop out and reapply- you cannot take a leave of absence as an undergrad. It was really scary a couple of times, you know, you're already struggling enough."
"I found that one thing that was not helpful to the nontraditional students is that UNC has a good place for career resources for young graduates. I felt like it was not a place for me because I was older. The companies that come in to recruit are looking for people right out of college who are usually 22. I didn't fit that mold. So already those companies were looking at me like, well how come she's 25? There also wasn't any information for me about where to go and what to do. Undergraduates must get it in their dorms or from their friends, but I never found out about anything. I had to do a lot of walking around and finding out for myself. I had a lot more experience and yet I only got a couple of calls. It would be really helpful to have a point person, one of the counselors maybe, to take care of the nontraditional student."
"I approached the TAs more on a peer type of level, and in a sense I think that intimidated them. They're at that limbo stage where they're not full professors yet, and they're trying to maintain that sense of authority in the classroom like a professor does. With a nontraditional student they have a harder time setting up those ground rules. TAs were more likely to be intimidated than a professor."
"I had one class, where I was totally intimidated by the professor I did not feel welcome in his class. There were maybe two or three nontraditional students in the class, but the others were younger than me, they were maybe in their 20's. I never felt welcome. Also when I went to talk to him, I just didn't feel welcome, even in his office one-on-one. I had to pull teeth to get him to talk. I think it was because I was a nontraditional student and he didn't know what to do with me. I know he knows his discipline, but I worry sometimes if [professors] are intimidated by someone their age. You're certainly, as a professor, not intimidated by an 18, 19, or 20 year old. I wondered if maybe because I was near his age he was intimidated."
"The worst possible professor is the professor who totally ignores you. Even when you go to the office and he ignores you, and you feel that he doesn't want to spend any time with you, and you have to pull everything that comes out of his mouth out yourself. One time I went to him in his office and I felt he was so unresponsive. I never went back. I went once and it was so uncomfortable that I would not go back again. I said, 'I'll pass this class one way or the other without that.' "
"In one class, when I first went, I talked a lot. I participated in class discussion. I was expressing how I felt about what was going on, and he I thought he didn't like what I said sometimes. One time I said something and another female student backed my position up and he didn't seem to like it. After that I didn't talk much anymore- maybe he didn't want to bring in that perspective. It's not that he didn't want to hear your interpretation, but, it's like his was the really right one."
"I would very much like some educational process [about nontraditional students] within the departments. To say that 'you will be confronted with people who are not the traditional age. That's to be expected.' Just to let them know that within their realm they are going to have to accept the idea that those students are as valid as the traditional students. They might intellectually accept it or know it in that sense, but I do often feel that when I go and talk to different people- I've never found anyone who hasn't been helpful- but it's always like, 'Why are you here?' They're not always well equipped to deal with something that is out of standard."
"I feel like I'm able to contribute to the classes because I do have a certain number of years of experience that make you see things very differently. In the large sense of education, that's a contributing factor. Maybe I can't do the set courses, or go on study abroad programs for the target language. Then it shouldn't be so tough for them to figure out a way to help me work around it. They would be doing themselves a favor by making it seem more positive from their side toward me by saying, 'Gee here's somebody who really wants to contribute to our department.' I have a sense of being under-used."
"I felt that actually having people know that I was a nontraditional student was helpful. Sometimes professors and students wonder. It's kind of easier if they know, if they know that I have kids or I'm married, then I don't have to explain. People feel like they don't have to ask and they don't feel uncomfortable because they don't know. The actual not-knowing is maybe uncomfortable for them."
"It's very important for a teacher of any kind to be able to say when they don't know the answer to something. And then to follow up on it. If I ask a question in class and they don't know, rather than giving me some answer or giving an answer that's not right or making me feel stupid for asking the question, it's much better if they say 'You know I really don't know. I'll see what I can find out and I'll get back to you tomorrow.' And then get back tomorrow. That makes you feel like there's a lot of honesty and you trust the person. They care about what you ask."
"I've had situations where the professors don't know [an answer], and it sort of backs the class up. They're uncomfortable and then it makes everybody uncomfortable."
"It's better when the professor does make a mistake to have them admit it. It's not hard to get confused when you're on your feet, and I've had professors make mistakes. And they've come back to the class and said, 'Look in your notes from yesterday there was a mistake' "
"Keep an open mind in the classroom. Use [the diversity that a teacher finds in the classroom] to their advantage. In the university system, they're going to find people from all different kinds of backgrounds: people who come from wealthier families, or people on scholarships, or people from up North, or people from here, or even foreign students. I think if they would keep an open mind and stop trying to keep their classroom molded into one entity, and try to use that diversity to their advantage to teach better, I think that would work. They're going to learn a little bit in the process, and they're going to keep their students better informed about the world in general. Just keep diversity in mind when you're teaching instead of trying to change it all to conform to one entity."
"Try to be as organized as possible with your materials. If you go in the class and you have slides to present and you're giving handouts of some kind, those handouts should be given the day of, not the day afterward. They should even be given beforehand so you have the chance to understand beforehand what you're going to see."
"Realize that everybody learns differently. While you have a set curriculum which you have to stick to by and large, just be aware that students learn differently and try to work it so that you can incorporate all students into it."
"The most important thing is for a young TA or a professor certainly not to be intimidated by an older student. I had one class where I asked the TA if he was intimidated by our ages. He wrote me a note and he said no, that he wasn't and that he had learned so much from us. But we had learned so much from him in that class too. Basically do not be intimidated by a difference in age. "
"Include. Be sure that all older students are included in class discussions and things like that."
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Last Updated: January 30, 2001