Why Boomers Must Invade Schools – Part II
Fri, Mar 5, 2010
By BabyBoomers.com Member: Samiram Khatib
…In this fluid marketplace a multiple identity is one of the best buffers against unemployment. Baby boomers as a whole are better educated than any previous generation, and their “education gives them an edge in the labor force where a college education is worth more than ever in the market place,” according to Campbell Gibson (4). Despite this, there are 9 million boomers who lack even a high school degree, according to a recent report by the Urban Institute. The number of people over the age of 45 with income below the poverty line rose to 10 million by the year 2005 according to the same source.
The nagging question to be asked is: Should boomers retreat, enjoy retirement, sit at home with the remote control in one hand and a book in the other and vegetate on their couches? Should they be content to repeat their parents cycle of early aging, waiting for the children to drop the grandchildren for a week-end stay and run for their busy schedules, or should they undust themselves and go back to schools, take advantage of the new information revolution and the government and employer’ funded training. 40 more years of life expectancy is worth the challenge of living it to the fullest. But how is this achieved?
As a whole, when the new millennium arrived and the first boomers turned 55, they did not look like their parents at that same age. At 55, the previous generations looked old, resigned to aging, and expected/accepted poor health as part of aging. 60 year-old today bring to mind images of very healthy, dynamic active people rather than old grandpas and grandmas images. It brings to my mind the image of a pink-cheeked lady wearing an elegant pink jogging suit, and trendy Nike sneakers, jogging energetically to the bus station to meet her granddaughter arriving from college to spend the thanksgiving holiday with the grandparents. “Meet grandma.” The young girl said to me and she watched me pull my jaw muscles to prevent it from falling. I was expecting my overweight grandma, with her gray-hair and denture, who at 55 described sicknesses modern science has yet to discover.
I am a proponent of the notion that baby boomers, who did everything different, do belong in the high institutes of education. Gail Sheehy insists that boomers do not start thinking of retirement but rather what do they rally want to invest their life in (2). She notes that women who have passed through menopause feel a power surge. As family obligations fade away, many are motivated to “stretch their independence, learn new skills, return to school, and plunge in a new career,” (4). Men, more conservative, do not anticipate a huge change in their life fifty and beyond, according to Sheehy (4).
As boomers hit middle age many of them returned to school. 23 million Americans were involved in adult education in 1984 compared to 100 million by 2004 according to Michele Compton and Candy Schock who conducted a research about nontraditional students for “Women in Business Magazine” (14).
Students 40 years and over are the fastest growing population on campus and graduate school. They represent 11.2% of all those enrolled according to Alan Bruce (1). Most boomers go back to school for work-related reasons but by the time they graduate its the personal area that had been improved most; increased self confidence, knowing one-self better, and a life time commitment to continued education.
In her thorough study, Gail Sheehy notes that the “first adulthood just happened to you. The second adulthood, you can custom design.” The boomers, plenty, healthy, energetic, and well-educated can make the second half of their life as exciting as they wish it to be. In fact, with all the excitement of new discoveries in spirituality, medicine, information, and technology, the new horizons of cosmetic surgery, stem cell research, DNA decoding, anti-aging remedies and many more years of life expectancy, boomers have but one choice: To invade higher education institutes, demand more new exciting fields of study and careers, and set themselves to go.
“Find your passion, and pursue it,” urges Sheehy, “Pull up your dormant self.” (9).
Whether they need the new degree for job security, self-satisfaction, a new or advanced career, or merely to decorate the living room walls makes no difference. This new exciting world is there, waiting for their conquest. And they earned it every time.
Part I here
(Contact Samiram at unkeedo@adelphia.net)
Sources:
“The Baby Boomer’s Aging Won’t Curtail Demand.” USA Today Magazine. April 97:4.
Blanchette, Patricia Lanoie. “Health and aging among baby boomers.” Generations. Spring 98: 76.
Bunce, Alan. “Baby Boomers Reinvade the Student Union.” Christian Science Monitor. 25 Nov. 1996: 13.
Compton, Michele & Candy Schock. “The Nontraditional Student in You.” Women in Business. July/August 2000: 14-17.
“Conversation about Demography with Harold Hodgkinson.” Connection: New England’s Journal of Higher Education & Economic Development. Summer 99:15+.
Gibson, Campbell. “The Four Baby Booms.” American Demographics. Nov. 93:36-37.
Gramigna, Glenn. “The Second Time Around.” The Buffalo News Magazine. 7 Oct. 2001: 20-21
Sheehy, Gail. “New Passages.” U.S News & World Report. 6 Dec. 1995: 62+.
“Save the Baby Boomers.” Techniques: Making Education & Career Connection. May 98: 7.
Kantrowitz, Barbara. “Health For Life.” Newsweek. Fall/Winter 2001 Special Edition: 4.
I went to law school at age 49 because I was bored with my life. I loved being surrounded by so many young incredibly active minds – it did not matter what the subject was at least one person had an idea on it that had never come to my mind.
Interestingly, there were 5 physicians in the class that wanted out of practicing medicine and were headed into the medical malpractice area of law.
I believe that no matter what your age education is of great benefit. I hope to be learning something new the day that I die. By the way, the past few months I have been working on Sudoku puzzles. This is a new skill for me and one that I believe is exercising my mind.
sheila, the comments on your experience is much appreciated. I too have thought about going back to school either for a law (JD) degree or a medical role. However, it’s the huge cost of education that is stopping me from doing so. I can live without the income (opportunity cost) of pursuing a degree, but to loose that income and put myself > $100k in debt is kinda crazy. Further scaring me is that I have already earned my masters degree and did not see a relative bump in my payscale.
I am trying to devise a strategy for myself where I can save up enough to pay for schooling in its entirety, however it seems almost impossible.