Increase in Nontraditional College Students Essay -- Exploratory Essay

Increase in Nontraditional College Students Seven Works Cited A 1995 report from the National Center for Education Statistics reveals that 76 million American adults, 40 percent of the adult population, are enrolled in adult education classes, an 8 percent increase from 1991 ("Adults Thrive"). Nearly 50 percent of the 14.2 million college and university students in the United States are over twenty-four years of age, and the percentage is rising (Mathews w22). Enrollment in degree programs at the University of Phoenix, the University of Denver, and Regis University, schools catering to working adults, has almost doubled in the last five years (Scanlon 3A). Between the reporting years 1985-86 and 1996-97, nationwide enrollment increased 11 percent among students between the ages of 25-29, 5 percent among 30- to 34-year-olds, and a whopping 65 percent for those 35 years old and older (Hussar 4). What explains the increase in the enrollment of nontraditional1 college students? The causes are many and range from changes in the job market and the work environments to a desire for a more rewarding career and to an increasing U.S. population. One reason for the enrollment increase is job changes and company downsizing. As companies adjust to ever-changing economic conditions, many people find themselves unemployed and look to a college education to help them attain different or better jobs. And it is not only newly hired, younger employees who are the unfortunate casualties of corporate downsizing. Tonye Nelson had been an accounting clerk for twenty years. On March 2, 1996, she arrived at work only to be told she had been laid off because of company down... ...: w22. Online. Lexis-Nexis. 2 Nov. 1998. Pickard, Marilyn. Personal interview. 19 Nov.1998. Rich, Kim. "College Pays." Anchorage Daily News 4 Aug 1996: D.1. Online. Proquest. 19 Nov.1998. Scanlon, Bill. "Adult Education; Colorado Colleges Reach Out to the Grown-Up Crowd." Rocky Mountain News S Apr.1998: F.3A. Ouline. Lexis-Nexis. 2 Nov.1998. 1 Students between the ages of 14 and 24 are commonly considered traditional students, whale those aged 25 or older are considered nontraditional. 2 The baby-boom generation, those born between 1946 and 1964, comprises 76-77 million individuals, an average of 4.2 million births per year. The next generation of individuals, born between 1965 and 1978, sometimes called the baby-bust generation or Generation x, averaged only 3.4 million births per year.