Written by Stephen McGowan
So, you’ve decided to attend university as a mature student. Maybe you didn’t get round to it the first time, maybe academia wasn’t your thing, maybe there were other, more important things in your life. What matters now is that you’re there, so first things first; congratulations.
It’s difficult to go from life to study, especially if the last time you were at school is a distant memory. It’s hard to take those first steps of deciding you want to go and applying. So, kudos to you but be warned, it’s about to get harder.
Be aware that you are entering U.K. higher education at a perilous time. Cost-cutting, dissatisfied staff, and a culture war against humanities degrees is only the start of what you may experience first-hand. It’s hard not to feel undervalued as a student, let alone a mature one.
I left a stable, well-paying job when I was in my thirties to go to university. All my friends went in their teens and early twenties, but I missed that boat for a variety of reasons. I’d spent years wanting to be a writer but didn’t have the time or the knowledge to do so. Yes, I know you don’t have to go to university to write, but I wanted the experience and the practical skills that I’d lost after over a decade out of learning.
I was rejected for my first choice without comment, but another university stepped in and offered me a place on a foundation course and five years later I’m nearing the end of a MA in Creative Writing. I spent my time earning decent grades, and as a student union rep during Covid, strikes, and boycotts, so here is my advice to all you mature students about to set foot on campus.
First things first everything’s online now. From tutorials with your lecturers to handing in work, module guides, reading lists, and assignment submission points. Take the time to get to know the software used by the university. Play around with it, ask people for help if you need to. Visit the library for help if you need to. Universities usually have sessions where they help people with the technology on offer. Don’t be afraid to get help, you’d be surprised how many people need it and that’s what your tutors and the university are for.
Next is your working week. Universities place much more emphasis on self-study, so you might only be at lectures or seminars for a small part of the time. Find somewhere to work that will keep you motivated and focused. I worked either out of the university library or at a local cafe drinking some truly awful coffee.
In addition to your assignments, you’ll usually have prep homework for seminars that often includes reading something (a passage or an entire book) and answering questions about it.
What worked for me was going into the library hours before my seminar and doing it there so that it was fresh. It also helped establish the library as a workspace in my mind. Living in a house full of kids meant working from home wasn’t always possible so having somewhere that I only associated with work was important to me.
In seminars, listen a lot, talk a lot. I can’t tell you the number of times I didn’t understand something until I talked it through with other students or lecturers. I learned so much in seminars from the odd comment or tangent with my lecturers too. Don’t be afraid to ask or answer questions, argue the point, debate! As my Gran said,
“Shy bairns get nowt.”
Don’t be a shy bairn. It’s excruciating how often one of my lecturers asked a question and the room went dead silent. It felt like I was the only one willing to answer and I felt bad doing all the talking despite no-one else wanting to. It got to the point where I was counting to ten under my breath before speaking to give someone a chance.
As for the work, learn citations fast. I never learned it in school or college, but many of my cohort already knew how to reference in an essay. When I started, I thought it was going to be the hardest part of any assignment but there is technology to help you. Software or websites exist to do it for you. Try them, see what works best for you.
I use Zotero and it has never let me down. It links with Microsoft Word and all you must do is fill in the details of the source into Zotero, then in Word click add reference and type in the title. The reference (in your choice of style) is added, and it’ll even create a bibliography at the end for you.
If you haven’t been in education in years (over a decade for me), you will get lower marks on your first assignments than you want or expect. In the words of Douglas Adams,
“Don’t Panic.”
It’s new to you and you haven’t learned from your mistakes yet – you will. Read your feedback carefully and make an appointment with your lecturer to go through it so you really understand where you went wrong. They are there to help you with meetings before assignments and after. Make sure you’re using them as much as you can.
You’ll note I haven’t talked about the more social aspects of university. I spent most of my time there as a single dad who didn’t drink, so I didn’t feel able to take part with a lot of the more outgoing aspects of university life. A lot of the mature students I meet feel the same, so you won’t be alone in this. Through my lecturers I found local spoken word nights to perform at, and a writing group to join, which are extremely rewarding and give me less hangovers.
Find out what works for you and try not to feel like you’re losing out. Check out the clubs and join a message group with other students on your course. Remember that a lot of your younger cohort are at university to discover themselves and socialising is a big part of that. I was lucky that I already knew who I was when I started, and honestly, my social battery can’t manage the nightlife.
The last piece of advice I’ll give you is to open your mind. There’s a side to university life, and higher education itself, that’s easier for younger students but harder for us. Their minds are more malleable and they’re open to new ideas, thoughts, and experiences. We have more entrenched ideas and behaviours that should be interrogated too. Remember, they’re there to learn who they are, but that doesn’t mean we can’t learn a thing or two about ourselves along the way.