In the present study, we analyzed the narratives embedded in the undergraduate personal statements of 40 nontraditional students--ages 25 years and older--accepted to an undergraduate degree program in agriculture and life sciences. Although widely available to universities, personal statements have been overlooked in the literature of undergraduate student development. Through narrative analysis of these essays, we found evidence that approximately half of the students in the sample (21 of 40) displayed meaning-making abilities consistent with the developmental stage that scholars describe as self-authorship. Nontraditional students are widely known to be at very elevated risk for dropout. However, the presence of self-authoring abilities among this group represents an important, yet overlooked, asset which could be leveraged by institutions in order to improve the rate of success that these students experience.