Andy sits mid-way back in the class and says the reason he is returning to school is because he has four daughters entering middle school and he wants to set an example for them so that they will go on to get a college education. Susan, a single mom, says she is in the program because the only way she can be promoted at work is by earning a bachelor’s degree. Ralph has just been downsized and doesn’t have the skills necessary to meet today’s economy and the jobs available, so he has returned to college while he works a low-end job, hoping for a better future.  Ginny is a homemaker, recently divorced, needing to return to the workforce to help support the family, finds she has no marketable skills. These stories or similar are repeated over and over among adults who are going back to college. The reason for adult degree completion programs is thestudents; to make it possible for an underserved population to achieve their dreams. They deserve the best we can offer. They are serious about their lives and are looking for the tools which will help them build a future.

Adult Degree Completion (ADC) programs are programs which focus on providing non-traditional students, usually 26 years of age or older, an adult-friendly educational experience. While it might seem like the growing trend of delivering courses online would kill this delivery modality, the reality is that a significant number of adults want to sit in a classroom and need the personalized attention these programs provide. These programs are targeted at a segment of the population which started their college education but for some reason did not finish. Some of these programs also have opportunities for students to complete the full four year bachelor degree in this format. ADC programs often provide a way for the adult student to leverage their previous college credit and/or life experiences toward completing a degree, without having to duplicate work already documented, through a Prior Learning Assessment (PLA) process. All of this delivered in an adult-friendly format with classes meeting one night a week, one class at a time for five to eight weeks.

Many graduate programs are also taught in this format, allowing a student to attain the coveted masters degree without having to leave work and still have the robust classroom experience.

ADC programs have not always been widely accepted by the traditional campus. Many working in these programs have expressed the feelings of being ostracized by the traditional faculty, ignored, and marginalized as not being “real education.” Partly this is due to the format and partly it is due to the fact that a significant percentage of these courses are being taught by adjunct faculty, most of whom are practicing professionals. Their popularity with most campuses, however, actually hinges on the same points: the format, which opens up service to an underserved population who couldn’t participate in the traditional college model, AND the use of adjuncts which lowers the cost of the programs to the point that they actually run in the black. This last feature has often led to the ADC program being called the “cash cow” of the University, as the overages from the program are used to prop up traditional majors, campus initiatives, capital expansions, and general operating expenses.

I have been working in this field since the late 90’s and I have seen hundreds of lives changed through these programs. Admittedly there are a LOT of moving parts, but when they all are done well, the student is enriched and doors are opened for them which would have been impossible in any other way.