- Title
- Parent, partner, carer, breadwinner and student: The multi-layered identities of mature-age women returning to education
- Creator
- Stone, Cathy
- Relation
- Research Handbook on the Student Experience in Higher Education p. 452-465
- Publisher Link
- http://dx.doi.org/10.4337/9781802204193.00041
- Publisher
- Edward Elgar
- Resource Type
- book chapter
- Date
- 2023
- Description
- Within Australia and many other countries around the world, mature-age women are embracing lifelong learning opportunities. The entry of mature-age students into Australian higher education began in the 1970s and has continued to grow strongly ever since, with more women than men taking up this opportunity. The situation today is that around 40% of all Australian domestic students begin university as mature-age students - defined here as being 25 years of age or over - with women outnumbering men by around two to one in the 35-and-over age group. This chapter focuses on women entering higher education in Australia as mature-age students, examining their motivations for returning to study, their life circumstances and their competing identities and responsibilities. It also discusses ways in which institutional processes and policies can help and hinder the successful enactment of a student identity, with its implications for persistence and success, as these mature-age women navigate the complexity of their lives.
- Subject
- mature-age; higher education; lifelong learning; women; student identity; gender; SDG 5; Sustainable Development Goals
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1500888
- Identifier
- uon:55031
- Identifier
- ISBN:9781802204186
- Language
- eng
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