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 **My 15 year old daughter Alexys **


 * My 13 year old son Hunter **



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**Paula's Wiki** **WAYC1101 **media type="youtube" key="jHZxlW9xftk" height="344" width="425"include page="home" component="backlinks" limit="10" **The Non-Traditional College Student**
 * In the recent years, non-traditional college students have become more common than they have been in the past. I am a divorced mother of two teenagers. My children are in high school, and I made the decision to return to college to try to start a career in Criminal Justice. It is challenging, but well worth the effort. I worried when I registered that I would feel out of place, but I have adapted nicely to the people and surroundings of the college. I was also fortunate to get into work study at the college. I work in the Swamp Fox Cafe on campus. Being in college at my age is actually more common than most people would think. It has been a very good experience.

Being a college students is difficult at any age, but being a single mother and a college student is a challenge. It is important to find a balance between your school work and your home life. It is important to make sure you will have time to complete your school work and spend time with your children and other family and friends. The line between your time can blur at times, if you step back and take a look at your priorities, you will find that the line is clear. ** ** **I have been out of school for a long time, but with the Waycross Success class, I was able to learn tips on taking notes, writing papers, how to train (or re-train) your mind and memory to acknowledge new information. New students or returning students all have an excellent opportunity to better themselves, and their families. It is important to meet new people, to adapt yourself to the role of a student and peer, to be open-minded to criticism, and willing to accept and make the necessary changes needed to make your college experience the best it can be.** =Waycross College= Waycross College 2001 S Georgia Pky Waycross, Georgia 31503
 * I have learned from the text that it is important to be yourself, to make friends, it is important to be flexible and to manage your time wisely. I was also able to reaffirm that accepting people for who they are is of the utmost importance. There are a diverse group of people that attend college and college life is not easy, but it can be an acceptional experience, if you are open to change and criticism. Most of all it is important to just be yourself, let your personality shine through, people will accept you for who you are.


 * Website:** [|Waycross College]
 * Website:** [|Waycross College]


 * Type of college:**2-year public


 * Degree types offered:** Associate's


 * Degree Programs offered:**
 * * Business Management and Administrative
 * Health Professions and Related Sciences
 * Liberal Arts and Sciences / Liberal Studies || * Precision Production Trades Other
 * Protective Services Other ||
 * Classification:** Associate’s Colleges: These institutions offer associate’s degree and certificate programs but, with few exceptions, award no baccalaureate degrees.


 * 2004-2007 Enrollment**
 * **Total enrollment** || 861 ||
 * **Undergraduate enrollment** || 861 ||
 * **Percent of undergraduate enrollment by gender** ||  ||
 * Men || 32% ||
 * Women || 68% ||
 * **Percent of undergraduate enrollment by race/ethnicity** ||  ||
 * Non-resident alien || 0% ||
 * Black non-Hispanic || 20% ||
 * American Indian or Alaskan Native || 1% ||
 * Asian or Pacific Islander || 0% ||
 * Hispanic || 1% ||
 * White non-Hispanic || 79% ||

Information provided by the National Center for Education Statistics and the Carnegie Foundation.


 * Waycross College Information**

The [|National Center for Education Statistics] acknowledges there is no precise definition for non-traditional student, but suggests that part-time status and age are common elements in most definitions. In a 1996 study the NCES included anyone who satisfies at least one of the following as a non-traditional student[|[1]]:
 * Non-traditional student** is an [|American English] term referring to students at [|higher education] institutions ([|college] or [|university]) who generally fall into two categories:
 * Students who are older than the historically typical [|undergraduate] student (usually aged 18-25), and had interrupted their studies earlier in life
 * Students of traditional age but attending colleges or programs that provide unconventional scheduling to allow for other responsibilities and pursuits concurrent with attaining a [|degree]


 * Delays enrollment (does not enter postsecondary education in the same calendar year that he or she finished high school);
 * Attends part time for at least part of the academic year;
 * Works full time (35 hours or more per week) while enrolled;
 * Is considered financially independent for purposes of determining eligibility for financial aid;
 * Has dependents other than a spouse (usually children, but sometimes others);
 * Is a single parent (either not married or married but separated and has dependents); or
 * Does not have a high school diploma (completed high school with a GED or other high school completion certificate or did not finish high school).

By this standard, the NCES determined an astounding 73 percent of all undergraduates in 1999–2000 could be considered non-traditional, therefore comprising the vast majority of undergraduates students in the United States and representing the newly "typical" undergraduate. The origin of modern expansion in non-traditional student populations in the United States are often traced to the [|GI Bill] benefits for returning [|veterans] of [|World War II]. Among these benefits were funding for tuition for vocational and tertiary education. The vast amount of veterans from this period guaranteed a significant demand for higher education for non-traditional students, which was only compounded by the popularity of the program.

[[|edit]] Population
Older students may be returning to school for a number of different reasons: some pursued unconventional career paths while others are training for a career change; some may have chosen to wait to enter college due to military service, while others simply waited a few years instead of entering directly after [|high-school], or did not finish high-school and earned a [|General Educational Development] (GED) [|diploma] later in life. Some women who have been [|stay-at-home mothers] begin or return to college after their children begin kindergarten or have left the home. Examples of younger non-traditional students of the usual college-age are [|Olympians] or [|professional athletes], actors, dancers, and other [|performers] as well as other careers, who choose to forgo the "traditional" college for a non-traditional course of study in order to facilitate or accommodate that career while pursuing a degree. Still other reasons may influence a younger student to pursue a non-traditional course of study - no justification is necessary to attend, though there are criteria for admission. 

[[|edit]] Programs
Programs for non-traditional students include options for both full-time and part-time study, though both choices are not necessarily available at every institution. Many colleges offer programs within their regular curriculum to serve non-traditional students. [|Women's colleges] with long traditions have offered programs for older women who would like to return to school, such as [|Agnes Scott College]'s //Irene K. Woodruff return-to-college program//, [|Mount Holyoke College]'s //Frances Perkins Program,// [|Simmons College (Massachusetts)]'s //Dorothea Lynde Dix Scholars Program//, [|Smith College]'s //Ada Comstock Scholars Program//, [|Bryn Mawr College]'s //Katherine McBride Scholars Program//, and [|Wellesley College]'s //Davis Degree Program.// Similarly, [|Tufts University]'s REAL program (//Resumed Education for Adult Learners//) was originally intended to draw young mothers back into higher education, but soon expanded to admit men and women aged 24 or over. Programs have become more common-place, extending even to colleges in [|Ivy League] universities. [|Yale University] hosts a non-traditional student option through its [|Eli Whitney Students Program]. "Whitney Students" take classes with other undergraduates and may earn either a B.A. or B.S. degree. The Eli Whitney Students Program is very small and highly competitive. [|Brown University] also hosts a similar program called [|Returning Undergraduate Education]. 

[[|edit]] Colleges
In contrast, a few select degree-granting colleges (not merely "programs" or "divisions" within an existing college) are oriented entirely towards non-traditional students. Examples include the [|Fordham College of Liberal Studies] at [|Fordham University], the [|Columbia University School of General Studies], and the [|Harvard Extension School] at [|Harvard University]. The [|State University of New York] serves non-traditional students with their own college through the multi-campus [|Empire State College]. Students at these colleges may take all of their courses with other non-traditional students, or may share class with students from other colleges in the respective university, or some combination of the two. [|Distance learning] also caters to non-traditional students. Among the largest accredited examples is the [|University of Phoenix]

[[|edit]] References

 * 1) **[|^]** [|National Center for Education Statistics. "Special Analysis 2002 Nontraditional Undergraduates", Institute of Education Sciences, U.S. Department of Education. Accessed 03/18/2009].

[[|edit]] Further reading

 * Crimaldi, Laura, [|"Older residents follow Pathway to college"], [|Boston Herald], Sunday, January 4, 2009. About students successes in the //College Pathways// program at ABCD Learning Works in [|Boston], Massachusetts.
 * Rogers, Alan, [|"Non-formal Education: Flexible Schooling Or Participatory Education?"], Springer, 2005. [|ISBN 0387246363]

[[|edit]] External links
Retrieved from "[]"
 * [|The Association for Non-Traditional Students in Higher Education (ANTSHE)]
 * [|Alpha Sigma Lambda], the national honor society for non-traditional undergraduate students in the United States
 * [[image:http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a5/Nuvola_apps_bookcase.svg/30px-Nuvola_apps_bookcase.svg.png width="30" height="30" link="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nuvola_apps_bookcase.svg"]] || //This article relating to [|education] is a [|stub]. You can help Wikipedia by [|expanding it]//. ||