Going Back to School at Age 40

……my experience

It all started the year my oldest son graduated from high school and was awarded a scholarship to pay for one year of college.

I was newly divorced, working a full-time job and on my feet 8 hours every day. We lived with my mother in a mobile home on her property, and she was such a huge help! My two youngest were 7 and 5 and it was really hard on them both when I would come home each evening tired with no energy to play with them. I began thinking about how I could get a better job that wasn’t so physically demanding. Could going back to college be the answer?

My youngest son was determined by the Social Security Administration to be developmentally delayed the year before, and part of his income allowed me to drop to part-time employment and go back to college to finish working on my degree.

I’d completed my basics right out of high school but like many others, was tired of year after year of school with no break. So I quit after my fourth semester of college. That break lasted for 22 years, through 3 children, and 2 failed marriages.

With 3 children to support as a single parent, I decided very quickly that I needed more income than those jobs available to me with no degree could provide.

I’d always loved reading and learning, and was an A and B+ student in high school, but I was told enrolling as a non-traditional student (as older students were called at that time) would be more difficult. That did not deter me. My father had always told me that I could do anything I set my mind to, and I believed him.

It was a little surreal being back on the same college campus after 20+ years. Meeting with an advisor, buying my books in the same campus bookstore, hunting down classroom locations; these experiences were much the same. But others were drastically different. Teenagers sitting next to me in a classroom. Computers in the library. Instructors and professors who were younger than I.

But I absolutely loved it! Test-taking has always been easy for me. Mnemonic studying techniques ensured that I always passed with high marks. (Except for that one Accounting class — I just couldn’t get it!) My instructors were so easy to work with and I think I actually worked harder to prove myself just because I was often the oldest student in the class.

I was worried about the Statistics class my degree required.

I was worried because it involved math, which had never been my strong point — did you see the comment about Accounting in the previous paragraph? I got a D+ in Accounting — my worst grade ever! But Statistics involved algebra, which I’d never had in high school, and which the young nursing students who surrounded me were frightened of also. Nevertheless, I can’t tell you how much I LOVED that stats class! I came out of it with an A. Such a boost to my confidence.

One other class that I remember very distinctly was Debate. It wasn’t called that exactly; it was some Communications class (not speech; because I’d already had that) and once again, I was the oldest student in class. It gave me an entirely new perspective on how to argue from a viewpoint. When it was my turn to present my topic, I had prepared 19 points of rebuttal, most of which I didn’t get to use simply because the students in the class had not thought to ask them. But I was working to impress my instructor (who was in his early 30’s and rather nice looking).

I knew what I wanted from college and I had mapped out how I was going to achieve it.

I think sometimes young people enroll because it’s what is expected and they are not clear on what they want to study and where they want to be in 4 years. They change their major area of study once or twice, spend a lot of time socializing and not enough time with study materials. Of course there are exceptions. Just like the fact that not all older students have a hard time keeping up.

I completed my Psychology degree with a 3.43 GPA and was able to get a job the month after I graduated working for the State of Oklahoma Department of Human Services. Finally, I was able to support my children well. And the following year we bought a small house which is now paid off. I am so grateful when I contrast how my life was before and after I finished college.

This has reinforced my belief that you are never too old to go after your dreams.

If you can imagine it, you can reach any goal with enough hard work and persistence. And don’t ever let anyone tell you that you can’t do/achieve/be/learn! Because if you want it, you can have it.

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