Happy Nontraditional Student Week! There are many attributes to those defined as nontraditional students — from working status, to children, ethnicity, and age. I will be featuring a different nontraditional student every day this week — students who work hard to achieve their goals despite the factors that work against their success! I hope you find them as encouraging and inspirational as I do! If you are a nontraditional student, please share your story with me!

Name: Jennifer Harrison

I am nontraditional because: I am over 25 years old and I work full-time

College:  Dona Ana Community College at New Mexico State University

Major: Medical Information Technology

Share a bit of your story: your struggles, your proud moments, etc.

I struggled with a few things. The first was deciding on a major. I went through four other majors before deciding on one. When I started taking classes I felt really out of place; the core classes consisted of mostly kids who had just graduated from high school. I struggled to find people that I had any thing in common with. My first proud moment was when I had started taking classes in my major and realized that I loved it and that I was good at it. My final proud moment was getting my degree. Even though I was about to turn 30, I never gave up on myself and fought through everything to make it to the goal I wanted.

Advice to other nontraditional students:

My advice would be don’t give up you have a goal don’t let anyone or anything stop you from reaching it. Also, you are probably harder on yourself than anyone else could ever be on you.

Favorite inspiring quote:

“Do or do not. There is no try” -Yoda 

Thank you Jennifer for sharing your story! To all those who are unsure about attending college due to your age, do not let that stop you! Even at 30, Jennifer is still quite young in comparison to some graduates — the oldest student I have met graduated at 71 years old! You are never “too old” to earn your college degree!