NIU’s Office of Resources for Women will begin a special discussion group next month and a late night open house program for older female students.

A conversation group for women whose lives are changing will begin Oct. 4. Weekly meetings of “Turning Point: A Group for Women in Transition” will be held from 4:30 to 6 p.m. in the Wirtz House.

Women who have returned to school or have become divorced could benefit from the group, said Judy Lynn Skorek, office research associate. However, women in any other situations also are welcome. Topics will be set by the group.

One “Turning Point” leader is Dawn Scheffner, an NIU Career Planning and Placement counselor working on her doctorate in the adult education program. The group’s co-leader is Sue Rudolph, a doctoral student in counselor education.

A Tuesday night Open House will begin Oct. 4 from 4:30 to 10 p.m., during which women can meet other “non-traditional” students, sip coffee and get information about NIU. The Tuesday program will become permanent if there is enough response.

Both events are geared to the older female student, although others are welcome. Older women, often returning to school after being away several years, often feel isolated on campus, Scheffner said.

“One of the biggest problems is that because they are here going part-time or predominantly in the evening, they’re not able to develop the peer group interaction that full-time, traditional-age students are able to develop,” she said.

Many are divorced and must juggle school, job and family demands. Many commute and attend NIU part-time.

“They now have to manage the stress of another obligation,” Sheffner said. “Study habits now need to be adapted and changed to accommodate other obligations in life.

“We want people to stop in and bring up concerns or issues and feelings and to tell of any problems they have had in being a non-traditional student.”

Older women “have a tendency to be more serious students,” Skorek said. “I worked with an older lady last spring. She and her son were accepted to NIU at the same time.”

By fall 1986, women past the age of 30 made up 8.6 percent of the NIU student body, according to a recent study released by the NIU Office of Institutional Research. This growth seems to agree with a national trend toward older student populations.