Diaries

I am worried about mature and part-time students. There is a shared feeling among many that they are on the outside looking in; a fringe act in the festival of university life. One recently revealed that she felt so isolated she often sat in her car and ate her sandwiches - alone.  My heart went out to her but in fact, many of my fellow LUMS* have expressed similar feelings of isolation or exclusion.

If you think I'm being pessimistic, or exaggerating the problem, then consider this; one of the executives of the LUMS recently discovered the drop-out rate for mature students and part-timers - it is around three times higher than for other students! 

Now consider everything that these students have to reconcile with, prior to and during the time they spend at university. Without wishing to stereotype younger students as kids who have only themselves to worry about, and the comfortable bed at their parents to fall back on when they need it, there are certain commitments my section of the student body have almost exclusively to contend with. 

Dorinda cheers herself up with a song!

I studied part-time for around five years myself to get to university. I've had to balance my studies over the years with family commitments, relationships, paying the rent and negotiating with my boss - to mention just a few.  At one point I was studying and working two jobs, with barely enough money to buy food and heat my flat.  So why would people who have worked so hard to get there, leave university? 

The current goal of the mature students' group is twofold: we want to raise the profile of both the group and the section of the student body that it is there to represent, and we want the university to create a space where these students can get together; to meet each other and talk through these kinds of issues; create better integration of the mature student body, and make being a mature student a recognised, positive feature across campus. 

I would love to know what the experiences of students at other universities have been, and whether this phenomenon of a separated little community of mature students exists in other campuses.

I didn't make a snap decision to go to university myself, and I doubt many others did either. It seems tragic that anyone, having battled to get to university would end up turning tail. I don't want to use what would like to be a witty, light-hearted student blog as a political forum, and I know that there are struggling young full-timers out there working hard too, but isn't there something fundamentally wrong with what these students are feeling right now?

I'd like to hear from other students - either at Leeds or elsewhere - on this issue. Feel free to drop me a line at:

*Leeds University Mature Students