The increased college attendance of mature women students has played a major role in the changing demographics of college enrollment. This study examined the experience of reentry women during the initial period of adjustment from the time just prior to college entrance to the end of their first or second academic year. A pre- and post-test…

A study examined the life transitions of adult educators and their perceptions toward a summer university program. The Summer Chautauqua Program was conducted to model program evaluation techniques for students of adult and continuing education, to provide data for program planners relative to the maintenance and revision of the summer program,…

In 1986, responding to the nation's teacher shortage, especially in the fields of mathematics and science, Chevron USA funded the ENCORE Program to facilitate the entrance of nontraditional recruits into the profession with alternative credentialing. Chevron also funded this study of mid-life career change to teaching in order to enable…

This study examined the questions of what alterations to teacher preparation programs are needed to better accommodate the older, second career person. Focus of the study was on a group of students who had been recruited from industry into a special science/mathematics teacher preparation program. Recommendations for teacher education program…

To help adults develop an awareness of midlife issues, to encourage personal acceptance of the transition, and to introduce appropriate coping skills, a speech communication course was designed that relied on river trip activities to develop insights about this passage. The vehicle for the seminar was a four-day raft trip down the Green River,…

Women who, as adolescents, feared success in male-dominated fields, may demonstrate non-traditional career preferences later in life and return to school to pursue their new career aspirations. In-depth interviews were conducted with 25 women over age 30 who were enrolled in graduate or professional schools. Data showed that mature women students…

A special program was initiated in 1985 at George Washington University to encourage persons from other careers to pursue a second career in teaching in the Washington D.C. area. This report describes the variables that had to be and are continuing to be considered in the design of this training effort for mid-career professionals. Factors…

Student affairs professionals have come to realize that the student body on college campuses is changing. Adult students are filling the spaces left vacant by a diminishing traditional-aged student population. Interventions in student affairs, however, are often targeted for the specific developmental tasks of the traditional student. Student…

Through their own inventiveness and persistence, adults are circumventing institutional indifference and creating alternative educational networks to teach themselves art. Problems that must be overcome are as follows: inadequate instructor preparation, a generally narrow array of programs in most community centers with the preponderance of…

Studies have indicated that mature women maintain a permanent role identity along two dimensions, i.e., traditional women or nontraditional women. However, the lifeset of many mature adult women may be on the continuum between these two positions, i.e., in the position of "deferred achiever." The personality variables and sex-role orientations of…

A study investigated the experience of midcareer adults in self-directed graduate programs. It explored two questions in the researcher's personal experience: as a learner, what caused the researcher's change in learning-orientation from goal- to learning-oriented and, as a teacher, could the researcher justify using both self- and…

The relative impact of the aging process, pervasive changes in higher education, and career socialization experiences on college faculty members' distributions of work effort was studied. Secondary analyses were completed on the following surveys: the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education Survey (1969) and the Survey of the American…

Three presentations are provided from Symposium 34, Career Development, of the Academy of Human Resource Development (HRD) 2000 Conference Proceedings. "Emerging Career Development Needs as Reported by Adult Students at Four Ohio Institutions of Higher Education: A Qualitative Study" (Kathryn S. Hoff) reports 4 major themes emerged from…