WOMEN GO BACK TO SCHOOL FOR CAREER TWEAKS, ADVANCEMENT, ENRICHMENT AND, WELL, BECAUSE THEY WANT TO
STORY BY Marina Sarris PHOTOGRAPHY BY André Chung
It was the first week of a new semester, and I was fumbling with my backpack while I surveyed my college computer class. A lanky teenager sauntered up to me and began apologizing for missing the first day of class. “My ride didn’t come,” he said, “but now that’s worked out.” He stopped, apparently confused by the puzzled look on my face.
Then it hit me. “Oh,” I said a little too loudly, “I’m not the professor. I’m just a student who’s … older.” It wouldn’t be the first time I was mistaken for a professor. After all, I am what is politely called a “nontraditional student.”
When I enrolled at Howard Community College (HCC) in Columbia, I joined a small but significant sisterhood: women returning to school after one, two – or more – decades away. Our reasons are many.
Some are preparing for a career change while others hope to re-enter the work force after an absence to raise children. Some already have college or graduate degrees, while others are attending college for the first time.
Many nontraditional students choose community colleges, thanks to their reputation for lower tuition, open enrollment, evening classes, career training and nearby child care. Women 40 and older make up 15 percent of students earning credits and 27 percent of the noncredit students at HCC, whose total enrollment tops 30,000 full- and part-time students.
It can be exciting – and daunting – to be on campus long past the traditional age.
Much had changed since I went to college years ago, starting with my generation’s idea of technology, back then an electric typewriter and corded phone. This time around, I can download the course syllabus and upload assignments. Instead of hunting for exam grades on a sheet taped to a wall outside my professor’s office, I just have to open my e-mail.
It’s not only college that has changed. We’ve changed. Our lives are different than they were at 20. Women of a certain age often have children, jobs, mortgage payments and other responsibilities to juggle.
As one of my classmates, Lynne D’Autrechy, says, “For me, it was not the classes that were challenging but rather learning how to add classes, homework and exams to my other responsibilities. The previous times I was a student I was single, with no kids, and attended school full time.” As D’Autrechy concludes, “big difference!”
And what women want from education may be different, too. The nontraditional student “is coming back with a career path in mind,” says Alison Buckley, associate vice president for enrollment services at HCC. That may mean a focus on acquiring specific skills, as opposed to the general liberal arts educations many pursued in the past.
In the last decade, more “adult learners” have chosen nursing, health care and business programs over arts and science classes at HCC, she says. Buckley attributes the change to the economic downturn, which has re-focused priorities for mature students.
Cherise Tasker’s approach to continuing education is entirely practical. With the benefit of years of work experience, Tasker, who has a medical degree, is being strategic about her return to school. “I have to weigh the time and money I’m spending on my education and how that’s going to translate into attaining a position and the kind of work life I’m going to have.”
Tasker, 47, admits that a return to campus was the last thing she’d expected. But after 17 years in medical transcription administration, her job was eliminated. When she began looking for a new one, she discovered that job listings in her
area of expertise – which includes health care regulation and project management – requested very specific certifications and skills. “A lot of the time, companies are looking for someone who has had a laser-focus type of study,” she says.
Tasker was nervous when she registered at HCC for the Project Management Professional course, as well as a computer class, but she was glad to see other students around her age. She passed her certification exam on the first try.
College also may be a steppingstone for stay-at-home mothers who want to rejoin the workforce.
Lynne D’Autrechy left her job as a computer scientist 18 years ago to raise her family. She enrolled at HCC last fall to prepare for her re-entry into the field, which has changed considerably in the past two decades. She took classes in web development – a course of study that didn’t exist when she earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in the 1980s.
“The World Wide Web was not in widespread use when I stopped working to be at home with my kids,” she says. “But since then I’ve been interested in learning more about it.” Her goal: to create websites full time.
D’Autrechy, now president of BuzzQuake Marketing, landed her first freelance job after just one semester: creating a website for certified wellness coach Chris Crandell of Columbia. (www.deep-well-coaching.com)
Crandell is also a mid-life career changer. She has held varied jobs: chef, high school English teacher, co-manager of a catering business and administrator of Meals on Wheels in Columbia. But “something wasn’t right,” she says.
She went to an open house at Tai Sophia Institute in Laurel, where she gravitated to the wellness coaching session. Something clicked. “I knew I could use my teaching and nutrition backgrounds and have it all come together,” she says, while being “on the cutting edge of alternative medical care.”
Crandell graduated from Tai Sophia and opened Deep Well Health Coaching this year. “I had pretty much given up on finding the ideal job for me, and I finally found it at age 59,” she says.
The experiences older students bring to the classroom can change the atmosphere, says Mary Beth Furst, assistant professor in HCC’s business and computers division.
“When I have a disproportionate number of adult students, our conversations are different because their experiences are different,” Furst explains. “They have had checking accounts, mortgages and car payments, and in my business class that is helpful to draw upon when discussing cash flow.”
Older students are also less guarded than younger classmates, Furst continues. “They are more willing to express their ‘aha!’ moments openly,” she says. “I love having them in class.” At the same time, Furst acknowledges that her “paperless” classroom approach is easier for the 18- to-22-year-olds. The older students often have a harder time embracing the computer technology required by the learning management system that Furst employs. “I do tend to push people into technology,” she says.
Pamela Pinder, 56, credits community college professors with helping her along her own educational journey.
Pinder married young, raised a daughter and nurtured her grandchildren. She worked in day care and school after-care for many years. But something was missing. “I had always worked with children, but I didn’t have a degree,” she says. And even though she admits she’s older than most students, she says, “I knew it could be done.” Pinder dreams of opening a child care center and mentoring other women with similar aspirations.
So she enrolled part time at the Community College of Baltimore County in 2004 and switched to HCC five years later, after she moved to Savage.
She recently earned an Early Childhood Development certificate, to the delight of her grandkids. “They’re very proud of their grandmother,” Pinder says of her grandchildren, ages 19, 14 and 4. “It’s been a long journey, step by step, but I have always been blessed to have teachers who would guide me,” she says.
Pinder plans to stay at HCC until she receives an associate’s degree. “I’m not stopping,” she says firmly. *
