The Hope to Pursue a Dream: pursuing higher education as an older adult | Luisa Mesones | TEDxCSULB

More older adults are going back to school to pursue higher education. They are acquiring multiple degrees and shattering the perception that a typical college student is between the ages of 18-25. Older adults bring a lot of valuable contributions to higher education—more than people may know. Luisa Mesones is a 62-year-old second year graduate student in Recreation and Leisure Studies at California State University, Long Beach. She retired after working for 30 years at the phone company with only a high school education. After retirement, Luisa started experiencing memory loss, slurred speech, and experiencing excruciating joint and muscle pains, which turned into a fibromyalgia diagnosis followed by a breast cancer diagnosis three months later. Relying on research to learn about holistic medicine,and recuperation led to her enrolling in Community College for one semester of French. Luisa fell in love with education and ended up graduating with 4 Associates of Arts. She transferred to UC Berkeley, where she graduated with a BA in Ethnic Studies. Luisa’s passionate pursuit of higher education led to her current research interest in nontraditional students, specifically older adults who are pursuing higher education. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx