‘I went back to university as a woman over 60 and this is what I learned’

Kudos to you for being 60-something or a 60-plus and bravely deciding to enter the hallowed halls of academia to gain that longed-for degree, finish that dropped-out-in-third-year disappointment, indulge that late-life mid-life crisis or just to middle-finger the family who believe you and Alzheimer’s are romantically involved.

I really dislike being the disillusion-ist fairy but, take it from one who knows. Accept the third monkey’s advice, say nothing and buckle up buttercup; you’re in for a few shocks!

Shock 1: Your concept of mature age may be out-of-date. Contrary to popular belief mature-aged does not only apply to the truly mature-aged.

Some ivory-tower, out-of-touch bozos declared 30 year olds as mature! In what universe, in what uninhabitable, oxygen deprived la-la land is a yet-to-be-toilet-trained 30-year-old considered ‘mature’. Embryonically dated and generationally speaking, most of the 30 year olds I know are still the proverbial paternal eye-glint.

Mature student!? I don’t think so. Grammar and punctuation is a foreign language to this lot and spelling is as old-fashioned as Granmah (sic Grandmother).

For brevity’s sake, please repeat above for 40 year olds and 50 year olds… Well, minus the potty training.

(Zipper that mouth until half way through Shock 7).

Shock 2: Not everyone is as excited as you are to be at uni. To some this is just a bigger lunch at bigger school and yet, to others, it’s the Gunfight at the OK Corral. Do not expect your enthusiasm level to be mirrored in others.

Shock 3: Lecturers. I named my four North, South, East and West because they were polarising opposites in every conceivable way. Contrary to ‘showing the way’ I discovered A-type personalities gone viral, egos out of control, frustrated actors and flirts in both male and female categories.

My very first lecture was on ‘scholarship’. No, not what we Queenslanders referred to as the ‘old’ Year 8, but a how-to approach uni, study and written assignments.

Diligently I read the text because this lecturer was the author; I was star struck! Oh so hindsight-regrettably innocently I found a mistake in the text. Not just a typo but a genuinely misleading summary. Presuming the author would be grateful, I quietly addressed this with the said academic. It was acknowledged, corrected and reprinted (I guess at quite considerable cost).

Strangely, no matter how hard I worked, I never got more than a passing grade in this subject despite favourably high-grade assignment comparison. Your enthusiasm may not be welcomed, appreciated or sought-after; imagine that.

Here’s the secret to scholarship — that fancy name for uni assignment writing — tell them what you’re going to say; say it; tell them what you just said. Result: money saved on a text book corrected by a first year mature-aged nobody. You’re welcome.

Shock 4: Timetables. Universities are huge places. Please do not rejoice that your strategically, much-studied timetable miraculously synchronises as your 1-hour 8:30amm lecture is followed by 10am lecture; rookie, fluffy-cloud mistake.

Listen to me. The 8:30am lecturer will be late and/or run overtime. The 10am lecture hall will be a good 15-minute run from 8:30am lecture hall and the library will be a fast-paced 20 minutes from everything.

Shock 5: Again, timetables. If it worked in Semester 1, trust me, it will not work in Semester 2, so it’s best not to become complacent. Rework; rejig!

Shock 6: Booze ignorance. Under the well-someone-should-have-told-me orientation pamphlet, apparently there are licensed food vendors all over campus, which explains why no one ever wanted to join me for lunch at the cafeteria. I thought it was my anti-odorant.

Shock 7: Beware the ‘sucked-in’ popular tag. Initially it was “oh my goodness, these young ‘uns really like me and want me to be their assignment buddy”. Actuality though is that of course they do! You’re the ‘silly string’ that believed “the car broke down”, “the baby got sick”, “the dog ate too many chocolates”, “Mum’s sister OD’d”, “my son just ‘came out’” and “I swear I thought I was smoking oregano”. Combined, these individually believable excuses for lack of assignment homework, worked beautifully at the outset.

My six month not-so-stupid-student-badge translated this 20/20 as ‘sucked-in’ old woman. I got saddle sores from being the cavalry!

Ongoing shocks include that some, if not all, of the above students will be in your group assignments at some time in the next four to six years. Here, you have two choices: buy some bottom blister balm or verbally blast the f**k out of them for being lazy little a******s and, ever-so Nanna-like, threaten to go all Bundy/Mason on them while assuring them the Luger is not loaded. Obviously this is a dream sequence and not to be taken seriously.

It probably comes as no shock to any truly mature-aged first-time uni student that I offer this golden rule to monkey see, monkey do: keep your big mouth shut!

Have you considered studying as a ‘mature-aged’ student? What interests you?

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