Nontraditional students featured in BDN article

The Bangor Daily News published an article on older nontraditional students at the University of Maine. The feature focused on Lynn Pollard of Otis, a 51-year-old working toward a degree in anthropology in her first foray into higher education; and Charlie Hildebrant, a 47-year-old who owns a small landscape construction business in Dover-Foxcroft and is enrolled full time in the survey engineering technology program at UMaine. Lori Wingo, coordinator of the Division of Lifelong Learning Advising Center at UMaine, said a growing number of adult learners are registering for classes today. Adult learners age 24 and older make up nearly 40 percent of the undergraduate student body within the University of Maine System, according to the article. “Instructors love them,” Wingo said of adult learners. “They come to class prepared, they participate, they ask questions.” Unlike some younger students, she said, “they realize this is their investment and their opportunity.”