The Traveler

Issue date: 4/28/08 Section: News

Media Credit: Spencer Presley Karen Ament walks from Old Main lawn. This picture was a part of a multimedia photography project which featured five non-traditional students. The exhibit was previously a display in the Multicultural Center.

Students from the UA Lemke Department of Journalism completed a multimedia project about nontraditional students for a Photojournalism II class last week.

The project featured five students who attend the UA and are termed nontraditional:  age 25 or older, a single parent, married, have dependents, a part-time student, or working full-time. Students who might also be working on an interrupted higher education, financially independent or without a high school diploma, according to a press release.

The Multicultural Center exhibit involved five posters with photos and information regarding the students. There also were laptops set up at each of the posters with recorded accounts from the nontraditional students' lives.

Professor Eric Gorder said he originally assigned his students to an informational feature involving photography and research, but after Off Campus Connections and Scott Flanagin, director of Communications and Outreach, got involved, the project eventually evolved into an exhibit.

Gorder said the non-traditional students volunteered to be featured.

"The exhibit was a collaborative effort of OCC, the Department of Journalism, the Multicultural Center, the student technology center, Communication and Outreach and the multimedia resource center," said Susan Stiers, assistant director of OCC.

One non-traditional student featured was Debi England, who works with the OCC.

England saw the entire project go into effect. 

"The most interesting thing about this experience was seeing an idea like Susan's and Scott's become a collaborative reality with a chance to showcase some incredibly dedicated people and seeing how staff and faculty on campus could weave this project together to accomplish so many different objectives," she said.

England learned no two nontraditional students are alike, she said.

"I learned that I'm in good company as a nontraditional student, I'm tenacious and I'm going to succeed," England said. "Even when things get tough and when I think my academic career has just taken a nosedive, I remember that someone else has a harder time than I do and is still plugging along like the little engine that could."

Continued...

Page 1 of 2 next >

Article Tools