“Nontraditional students” returning to college after participating in the work force or raising children might experience “culture shock,” financial problems and fear of failing.

Sharon Howard, University Resources for Women director, said services such as counseling, brown-bag lunches, discussion groups and workshops are available to help students make a successful transition back to college. Topics such as stress control, assertiveness training, career exploration and financial management are addressed by the discussion groups, she said.

“We provide a central facility for women returning to the university,” Howard said. “We try to provide a supportive environment through activities like the lunches.

“The adult (female) student has a heavy role to bear and sometimes does not feel very confident about her possibilities for success,” Howard said.

Michele Peterson, a graduate student in secondary education, is a full-time student as well as the mother of two children. Her goal is to teach high school.

“It’s not easy coming back to school, especially when you’ve been out for 14 years,” Peterson said.

Howard said sometimes students returning to college have an adjustment to make, and they might face culture shock.

“They thought they spoke the language. But different social values may predominate,” she said.

Peterson said she did not face “culture shock” after returning to college, but she did fear failing. As a result, she uses her time more efficiently than she had as an undergraduate student, she said.

“I have a competitive attitude,” Peterson said. “I force myself to have the time (to study). I try to stay on task,” she said.

An additional pressure students returning to college face is financial, Howard said, adding she guides students to appropriate financial aid offices.

Nick Noe, NIU’s Institutional Research director, said, “Shifts are occurring in age distributions, and there has been an overall increase in female students and a decrease in male students at NIU.”

In the period between 1978 and 1986, the percentage of females 30 years and older pursuing undergraduate degrees increased by 43.3. The percentage of female graduate students age 30 and older increased by 35.8, Noe said.

For this same period, males aged 30 and older enrolled in undergraduate degree programs decreased by 14.8 percent, while the numbers of males pursuing graduate degrees decreased 4.7 percent.