Off the Beaten Path: ...The number of nontraditional college students — defined as students not attending college right after high school or who must work while attending — has seen steady growth since the 1980s as more people already working or raising a family decide to get a degree. A report by the National Center for Education Statistics in 2002 said 73 percent of all undergraduates were nontraditional students.
Some 81 percent of Black and American Indian students have at least one characteristic of a nontraditional student; 76 percent of Hispanic, 67 percent Asian and 66 percent of Whites do as well, according to the American Council on Education.
And for the 2008-2009 school year, a for-profit institution that seemingly caters to this population — the University of Phoenix — enrolled more new students than any other program in the country.
That could spell trouble for traditional programs slow to adapt to nontraditional needs. With the graduating class of 2008, the University of Phoenix’s online campus overtook Florida A&M and Howard universities as the top producer of bachelor’s degrees awarded to African-Americans.
According to U.S. Census figures, in 2005, there were 17.5 million college students. About 37 percent of them were 25 years old or older. Projections by NCES show more growth for the nontraditional crowd than for those entering college following high school graduation over the next few years.
