Content area
Full Text
The authors examine the learning experience challenges and expectations of adult learners, specifically Baby Boomers (born between 1946-1964), seeking a graduate degree in either an adult education or library science program at a university in the southeastern United States. Both programs are taught in a completely asynchronous online format. The authors interviewed current and recent graduates of these programs, examining the barriers, challenges, and achievements of identified Baby Boomer graduate students during their learning process. They provide recommendations and suggestions for departmental and institutional changes that will improve engagement and implementation of learning experiences for future students.
This study pertained to adult learners who identified as Baby Boomers. Generational cohorts (Creighton & Hudson, 2002) are defined as Baby Boomers (1946-1964), Gen X (1965-1980), Millennials (1981-1996), and Gen Z (1997-2012). Each generational cohort has its own distinct characteristics, values, work attitudes, and communication styles based upon its members' life experiences (Broughton, 2021).
Baby Boomer students interviewed for this study were retired or close to retirement. Many participants in this study had returned to school for personal reasons, e.g., a few were teaching part-time in a community college and wanted to learn more about adult learning and teaching at that level, some pursued going back to college as a personal goal, and others wanted to become more involved in community-based activities and believed these programs would strengthen their knowledge working within the community. Educators who teach classes with mixed generations are encouraged to recognize that adult learners bring different histories, life experiences, preferences, and values to the classroom. The purpose of this study was to examine teaching and learning of the Baby Boomer generation who were enrolled in these programs or had graduated in the previous year.
Today's education and campus look quite different from those that existed when Baby Boomers were seeking an undergraduate degree in the late 1960s through the mid-1980s. According to Hoffower (2018), "Today's colleges are more expensive with increases in technological advancements and opportunities, diversity, stress, and competition" (p. 1). College classrooms are different with online learning and electronic resources. Professors and students are connected virtually through online resources. These differences from Baby Boomers' earlier undergraduate experiences involve more than changes in face-to-face and online learning, including also changes in communication,...