Adult students gain more access to education

Adult students gain more access to education

The U.S. Department of Labor recently projected that in the coming decade, 90 percent of new high-growth, high-wage jobs will require some postsecondary education. As a result, a growing number of adults are returning to school in order to increase their job qualifications.

Schools such as the University of Wisconsin (UW) in Eau Claire are creating online degree programs that are designed to meet the needs of nontraditional adult students, according to The Spectator. For example, the school recently announced that it will offer an online bachelor's of professional studies (BPS) degree. The school designed the BPS degree program in order to provide learners who have earned an associate's degree with access to higher education.

To create the program, a BPS committee was formed last summer. Kate Lang, chair of the group, said that many students have jobs that require a bachelor's degree to receive a promotion.

The seminars "teach them research methodology and let them do service learning or student-faculty collaborative research that are really the hallmarks of a UW-Eau Claire education," Lang told the news source.

By Mark Danson