Not just “high-school grads … a few years late”
If you’ve heard the phrase “today’s students” used to describe the many adults and other so-called nontraditional students who make up a huge share of the population now attending college, you’ve got Julie Peller to thank for the nomenclature. She helped to make the term popular while at the Lumina Foundation and then at Higher Learning Advocates, a bipartisan organization she formed to push for federal policies that reduce the barriers those students face in enrolling in and completing college.
I like the term because it defines students with life experiences and responsibilities beyond those of recent high-school graduates for who they are, not who they aren’t. An added impetus for Peller was getting “tired of hearing members of Congress talk about ‘those kids on campus’” when she knew about a third of all undergraduates were over the age of 25, one in five was a parent of a dependent child, and more than 30 percent were working full time.
Peller founded Higher Learning Advocates seven years ago, right before I began focusing on older students (in “The Adult Student” report in 2018 and often in this newsletter, mostly because I realized that the more flexible colleges become in serving adults, the better they can serve students of any age). Peller and her organization have been go-to sources for me, and I’ve moderated some of their events on Capitol Hill.
Last month HLA announced a transition: a move to continue a 40-group coalition it helped create but reduce the staff of HLA, its parent organization. Starting in June, HLA’s managing director of advocacy, Tanya Ang, will become executive director of the Today’s Students Coalition, which Peller calls a “deliberately big-tent” organization with ambitions to grow even larger. Peller will stay on as a board member.
The moment seemed a good one to check back with Peller on where she’s seen progress for today’s students and where there’s still work to do. Spoiler alert: There’s still plenty to do.
First, the positive: Policymakers and campus leaders increasingly recognize that many adults are enrolled in college, Peller told me over lunch last week, and that “they aren’t just recent high-school grads who showed up on campus a few years late.” Responses to the pandemic experiences may have helped them, Peller noted, as more colleges developed online and hybrid options and destigmatized time off in pursuing a degree.
But recognition goes only so far. Too often, existing systems and customs still aren’t oriented to students who can’t make college their first priority. “Higher ed needs to fit into a busy life,” Peller said, “and not the other way around.”
How does that happen? Here are four ideas distilled from our conversation, plus Peller’s take on one trendy idea she’s not so hot on right now.