Describe community college student Margaret Beaumont and she sounds like any other undergrad — she lives on her own, likes to read and says “Dr. Phil” and “Oprah” are two of her favorite television programs. She struggles with some classes, especially those on abstract art, but she gets mostly A’s.
Beaumont, though, has considerably more life experience — and school credits — than most co-eds. She is 82 and has 167 credit hours at Lincoln Land Community College in Illinois. Sixty credits are needed for an associate’s degree; she’s earned nearly three degrees so far — and says she’s not finished.
In her ninth decade, Beaumont one of about 78,000 college students in the United States that are over the age of 65. With total numbers of students enrolled throughout the country topping nearly 14 million, her age group is just 0.6 percent; but it is steadily increasing, according to the U.S. Department of Education. Reasons for returning to school vary from staving off boredom to wanting to delve into areas of study once unavailable to women.
Beaumont is a graduate of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a degree in home economics.
“My father said I should major in home economics because they gave scholarships [for that major],” Beaumont said. “So that’s what I did.”
She earned her bachelor’s degree in 1944, married and had four children. But there was no career for her. It was unusual for women to work outside the home in those days, and her husband held to that idea.
“He thought if I worked, then people would think that he couldn’t support us,” Beaumont said.
The couple eventually divorced. Beaumont taught knitting classes for a while, then worked 23 years as a bookkeeper.
At her children’s urging, however, she made some changes in her life and started taking classes at the community college in the fall of 1986. She has earned two associate’s degrees: one in electronic data processing, the other in fine arts. She continues to take courses in art and anything else that interests her.
Staying busy is also what brings fellow student Mae McMillen back to school.
The 74-year-old takes courses on criminal justice. “If I don’t get out and do something,” she said, “I would just go nuts.”
It’s been tough going back to school, she said.
“I had been out of school for 50 years and had to learn how to study and learn,” she said.
McMillen said it has been interesting taking classes with younger students.
“They give their opinions and I listen, then I give mine,” she said. “They say they’re bored. I laugh and say, ‘Come on, I never had electricity or cell phones when I was in school.'”
She’s also maintained perfect attendance — something younger students don’t have, McMillen said. “My feeling on that is, if you are going to do it, then just do it.”
At 52, university student Sonnie Moritz is one of the older students at the University of Illinois at Springfield. She’s simply following in her mother’s footsteps, she said.
“My mom graduated from college when she was 46 and got her master’s when she was 52,” Moritz said.
It also has been a long road back to campus for Evelyn “Evie” Burchett. She was 67 when she earned a degree in art. Burchett said that crossing that stage at graduation was something she had been waiting to do since 1955.
After her junior year, she dropped out of college and went with then-fiancé Ron Burchett to Germany while he did a brief stint in the military. She worked for years as an assistant buyer for a clothing store, then was a housewife and worked part-time. She was always busy and said she never felt the need to go back to school. But that changed one day when she had a conversation with her grandson.
“One of my daughters worked at MacMurray College and I told my grandson that since his mom worked there, he should go to school [there] since he could go for free. He knew that I had quit college and he said, ‘I’ll go if you go,’ probably never dreaming I would take him up on it,” Burchett said.
Though she took time off after being widowed, she was determined to keep going. She wanted her bachelor’s degree and liked being with the students.
“They were a lot of fun,” she said. “They looked at me like I was the professor. But after a few days, they realized who I was and that I was having the same problems they were.”
And even with the completion of her degree, the learning didn’t end. She since has taken a class in sign language as well as a dance class. As for her diploma, she plans to frame it.
“I feel empowered,” Burchett said. “Having that piece of paper, it gives you self-esteem for having accomplished that.”