Navigating Higher Education “Nontraditionally”: Opportunities and Obstacles in Post-Traditional College Pathways to the Baccalaureate

Abstract

A growing number of students initially enroll at four-year institutions as “traditional” but encounter discontinuous college trajectories and an extended time-to-degree. Much is unknown, however, about these students, whom we define as post-traditional. Using Bourdieu’s conception of capital as a framework, our qualitative study examines what stands in the way of these students completing a bachelor’s degree on time and what helps them to finish. Using data from 40 post-traditional college graduates, we found that social isolation was a common barrier to persistence, compounding other difficulties with help-seeking and limited financial support. Post-traditional graduates were able to persist and overcome their obstacles by activating capital in the form of economic resources, acquiring bureaucratic know-how, and finding communities of support. By elucidating the complexities of post-traditional student experiences, we argue for higher education to embrace new policies and practices that improve how we serve the students often discussed as “nontraditional.”

The river is a common metaphor used to describe the complexity of pathways through higher education. Bowen and Bok (1998) stated that “the nurturing of talent is a process akin to moving down a winding river, with rock-strewn rapids and slow channels, muddy at times and clear at others” (p. 1). Hence, for many undergraduates at four-year colleges and universities, the path to the baccalaureate is neither smooth nor linear—leaving some to fight against the river currents for a period of time far longer than the four-year window expected for “traditional” college students. Indeed, the timing for bachelor’s degree completion, on average, is 5.7 years (Shapiro et al., 2016), an estimate that has increased over time since the 1970s (Bound et al., 2012). Still, many students take longer to graduate than available data sources can track enrollment behavior. For instance, nearly one in four bachelor’s degree earners in 2015–2016 finished in over six years (Velez et al., 2019), demonstrating that many undergraduates struggle to move seamlessly through the proverbial river.

Despite the widespread use of the “traditional” versus “nontraditional” dichotomy of categorizing undergraduates, this binary framing increasingly fails to account for the diversity of enrollment behaviors and life circumstances among today’s students. Many scholars have critiqued the term “nontraditional” as marginalizing, as it implies deviation from an outdated norm (Soares, 2013), although most college students today can be defined as “nontraditional” in some capacity (Deil-Amen, 2015; Radford et al., 2015). Instead, we adopt the term post-traditional (Iloh, 2018; Soares, 2013; Spencer et al., 2023), which more accurately reflects students who, although beginning their college journeys as “traditional” undergraduates, experience extended and interrupted trajectories toward degree completion. Although the experiences of post-traditional students remain understudied, understanding these pathways is critical as their prevalence grows.

Myriad and nuanced reasons may explain why educational trajectories vary for individual post-traditional students, but the most pertinent challenges are systemic and pervasive rather than idiosyncratic. As noted by Kurlaender and Hibel (2018), examinations of inequality in college pathways are commonly framed by theories of capital, advanced by Bourdieu (1986) as social capital, cultural capital, and economic capital. An extant body of literature, especially scholarship from the sociology of higher education, demonstrates the particular importance of financial, cultural, and social resources in affecting students’ postsecondary experiences (Armstrong & Hamilton, 2013; Deil-Amen & Tevis, 2010; Goldrick-Rab, 2006, 2016; L. Hamilton et al., 2018; Jabbar et al., 2019; Jack, 2016; Massey et al., 2003; McCabe & Jackson, 2016; McDonough, 1997; Mullen, 2010; Rosenbaum et al., 2006; Spencer & Stitch, 2023; Stich, 2012; Stuber, 2011; Tierney & Venegas, 2006). However, much of the prior research in this area only offers a snapshot of one phase of the college student experience, typically for those of a “traditional” age, rather than providing a comprehensive understanding of the role that capital serves from college entry to completion for post-traditional students.

Using Bourdieu’s (1986) framework of social, cultural, and economic capital, this study contributes to the literature by exploring how post-traditional students navigate and respond to their circumstances throughout their undergraduate experience in higher education. Although we cannot disentangle every aspect of their complex trajectories, we seek to understand better the obstacles post-traditional students face, the strategies they employ to persist, and what their experiences tell us about the structures that prevent and support student completion. Specifically, we address the following research questions: (1) What economic, social, and cultural capital barriers do post-traditional students encounter on their path to a bachelor’s degree? (2) How did post-traditional students activate forms of capital to overcome their challenges to complete their degrees?

Using a unique set of qualitative data collected through interviews with 40 post-traditional college graduates, our study offers important conceptual contributions to the study of students with lengthy and nonlinear trajectories, and it also underscores the systemic inequities embedded in higher education, where the expectations for success privilege certain forms of capital that students may not possess at the outset. First, our findings point to compounding capital barriers throughout their complex careers in higher education, which stymied their persistence to degree completion. Second, our findings also reveal how post-traditional graduates develop, activate, and convert forms of capital over time, enabling them to persist and eventually finish their degree programs. As such, this study elucidates how many college students complete their degree program “nontraditionally” despite starting their journeys as what many consider “traditional” students.

Our article proceeds as follows. First, we discuss prior research on the characteristics and trajectories of post-traditional students, and then situate what is known about college persistence through the theoretical lens of Bourdieu’s (1986) forms of capital. Second, we outline the study’s qualitative methodology, including participant recruitment, data collection, and analysis. Third, we present our findings, organized around the barriers associated with each form of capital and how participants later acquired, activated, and converted capital to overcome these obstacles. We conclude with a discussion of these findings and offer broader implications for theory, policy, and practice, emphasizing the need for higher education institutions to adopt more inclusive approaches that better support post-traditional learners.

Background and Prior Literature

Our review of the prior literature begins with a summary of the factors most commonly linked to post-traditional students and their persistence in completing degrees. Instead of providing an exhaustive discussion of the existing literature on persistence—particularly regarding pre-college, environmental, and institutional influences often theorized to impact college students (Bowman, 2023; Melguizo, 2011; Museus, 2014)—we focus on individual characteristics, such as age and enrollment behaviors, that influence their ability to persist seamlessly through higher education (Soares, 2013).

Age is a key characteristic of post-traditional students, with the United States Census Bureau (2020) reporting that over 24% of all undergraduate students in 2019 were 25 years old or older. In the fall of 2021, the number of students in this age range totaled 6.3 million undergraduates (De Brey et al., 2023), and much of the research on these adult learners has focused on those enrolled at community colleges (Bahr et al., 2021). Compared to younger undergraduates, older students face several challenges that impede their persistence and degree completion, including family obligations (Markle, 2015; Taniguchi & Kaufman, 2005), employment (Gilardi & Guglielmetti, 2011), and academic performance (Bean & Metzner, 1987; Markle, 2015). Accordingly, most definitions of post-traditional students in the literature incorporate these characteristics and descriptions of their academic intensity (e.g., part-time enrollment) and other enrollment-related behaviors (Bean & Metzner, 1985; Choy, 2002; Horn & Carroll, 1996).

Students with post-traditional characteristics commonly engage in enrollment behaviors that impede persistence and, thus, exacerbate the timing of degree completion. For instance, research shows that older students are more likely to engage in lengthy, nonlinear enrollment pathways (Milesi, 2010; Zarifa et al., 2018). Studies analyzing enrollment patterns using nationally representative data have found that the percentage of students who follow so-called “traditional” paths to the baccalaureate ranges between only 15% and 38% of all undergraduates, but far more students engage in disrupted, nonlinear trajectories through higher education (Boylan, 2020; Monaghan, 2020a; Soares, 2013). Such “nontraditional” pathways may include specific behaviors such as temporary enrollment disruptions, commonly referred to as stopouts (Goldrick-Rab, 2006; DesJardins et al., 2006; Johnson, 2006; Mabel & Britton, 2018; Stratton et al., 2008); lateral transfers between four-year colleges, and reverse transfers from four- to two-year institutions (Adelman, 2006; Goldrick-Rab & Pfeffer, 2009; Kalogrides & Grodsky, 2011; Spencer, 2021; Spencer & Stitch, 2023); and “swirling” enrollment across multiple institutions (Johnson & Muse, 2012; McCormick, 2003; Peter et al., 2005). Collectively, these quantitative studies highlight the diversity in undergraduate trajectories and help to estimate the diversity and complexity of the student population that does not meet the “traditional” criteria.

In contrast, fewer studies explore how these students make sense of their educational journeys. Aside from some research on community college students (Deterding, 2015; Nielsen, 2015), only a limited number of qualitative studies have examined post-traditional students at four-year institutions (Jepson & Tobolowsky, 2020; Monaghan, 2020b). In one such study, Spencer et al. (2023) investigated how post-traditional graduates reflected on their extended path through higher education. Their study participants matriculated as “traditional” age students but took an extended time to complete their degrees. Drawing on the work of Deterding (2015), the authors found that four-year college students initially enrolled with a goal-oriented, instrumental logic following their graduation from high school. However, after experiencing enrollment disruptions, their motivation shifted to what the authors termed expressive logic, driven by a belief in the moral value of higher education. These findings support Markle’s (2015) findings that post-traditional students exhibited a “will to persist that enabled them to overcome obstacles and ultimately graduate” (p. 281). Similarly, Deutsch and Schmertz (2011) used a feminist narrative approach to study adult women pursuing bachelor’s degrees, revealing how gender shaped their educational paths as participants balanced returning to school with work and caregiving responsibilities for children and older parents. Nevertheless, the women in their study found supportive, women-friendly communities among their peers and faculty, which provided both academic and social support.

Taken together, these streams of literature collectively offer insight into the behaviors, experiences, and motivations of post-traditional students. However, there is still limited research about the segment of those who initially enrolled as “traditional” following high school and took an extended path to complete their bachelor’s degrees. This includes a need to better understand how these students make sense of the factors that may have helped or hindered their progress to degree completion.

Theory

The present study uses Bourdieu’s theory of capital to conceptualize the barriers that post-traditional students face and the resources they use to navigate the norms for succeeding in higher education. According to the Bourdieusian theoretical system, society is understood to be composed of fields where people compete for social and economic advantage, each of which is shaped and governed by a set of “logic, rules and regularities” (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992, p. 104). Higher education is one such field. As a field and site of social reproduction (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1990), higher education, and the education system more broadly, reflects the normative values of the dominant white, middle-class culture in the U.S. Therefore, to easily and successfully navigate the “rules” of higher education, specific resources (i.e., capital) and dispositions are expected (Armstrong & Hamilton, 2013; Bourdieu & Passeron, 1990; Stuber, 2011). Identifying the capital-related barriers students face offers insight into the stumbling blocks normative structures create, which lead to enrollment disruptions, as well as the types of support needed by those students who choose to return later. Capital has long been used to analyze student behaviors as they navigate higher education, but what we know comes primarily from research centered on “traditional” age undergraduate students, leaving post-traditional student experiences underresearched. Below, we introduce Bourdieu’s (1986) concepts of cultural, economic, and social capital and provide an overview of prior research on how each affects students’ pathways through higher education.

Bourdieu (1986) proposed that cultural capital exists in three states: objectified (i.e., physical manifestations of culture), institutionalized (i.e., institutional credentials), and embodied (also referred to as the habitus). Embodied cultural capital is particularly salient in understanding students’ trajectories to and through higher education as it conceives of a person’s way of thinking and being as a set of dispositions that result from the imposition of social expectations beginning at birth. Social-class-based differences exist in how parents raise their children, and schools value and reinforce those practices and attitudes of the middle class (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1990; Lareau, 2000, 2003). Those whose embodied cultural capital is not valued by the education system are expected to acquire the knowledge, attitudes, and tastes that appear to come more naturally to their peers who were raised to behave in those valued ways (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1990). Many scholars have found that holding dominant forms of cultural capital manifests as possessing the “know-how” required to navigate the complexities of college (Deil-Amen & Rosenbaum, 2003), engage with authority figures (Jack, 2016), and access institutional resources (Roksa & Silver, 2019).

Economic capital is “immediately and directly convertible into money” (Bourdieu, 1986, p. 243). A robust body of research in the higher education literature has demonstrated the importance of financial resources for college access and completion, whether in the form of aid (Dynarski et al., 2022; Goldrick-Rab, 2016) or parental resources (L. T. Hamilton, 2013; Quadlin & Conwell, 2021). As the price of college has increased over the last several decades, additional pressures have been placed on families and students trying to save enough money to pay for college, whether through grants and scholarships, working, saving, or taking out loans (Goldrick-Rab, 2016). Navigating the complex financial aid system can be challenging for those whose families do not fit the normative family structures assumed by the federal government, as evidenced by the FAFSA questions and processes, which can have a negative impact on those from less advantaged backgrounds (Zaloom, 2019).

Lastly, social capital covers social connections between people, whether personal connections (e.g., friends or family) or through group membership (e.g., a college alumni network), and the resources embedded in these connections. Within the Bourdieusian framework, the value of social capital stems from the access it grants to other forms of capital. As such, one’s social capital is useful in a field (i.e., colleges, here) when it helps one to navigate that field successfully. For instance, students may leverage capital from their social ties to navigate the process of transferring vertically from a two- to four-year institution (Jabbar et al., 2019). These social networks require maintenance, which can be difficult when the habitus differs between members.

The importance of social capital to the success of undergraduates, particularly as it manifests as social integration within institutions, has been considered and debated at length. Tinto’s model of student departure (1993)—a widely cited theory of the factors that impact student attrition from college—is heavily critiqued for its assertion that in order for students to integrate optimally into their institution, they must separate themselves from their old communities. Although Tinto (1993) suggested that the impact of external communities might be a positive or negative one on student persistence, he notably referred to the potential effect that external communities might have on students as “being ‘pulled away’” (Tinto, 1993, p. 116). In contrast, Nora (2001) argued that “sources of encouragement from significant others” are a key component of successful student persistence (p. 49). Yosso (2005) also pointed to the social capital deriving from communities that do not necessarily have an institutional origin. Other concerns regarding Tinto’s model are echoed in the appraisals of numerous scholars (Davidson & Wilson, 2013; Museus, 2014; Tierney, 1999; Wolf-Wendel et al., 2009), which collectively suggest that separation from these external communities may be detrimental to some students.

As Davidson and Wilson (2013) noted, institutional social integration is not equally important in all settings and for all groups of students. The authors pointed to Bean and Metzner’s (1985) proposed model to explain “nontraditional” student attrition that included academic, background, environmental factors, and psychological outcomes, which they argued reinforced the importance of extramural considerations for “nontraditional” students while suggesting that institutional social integration was not critical for this population. In fact, Tinto (2012) himself acknowledged that “when [external] communities are strong, as they are for commuting students, their actions may serve to condition, if not counter, events within the college” (p. 116). These theories and critiques raise questions about the role external communities play in the success of college students as a source of social capital, and how both internal and external communities may support post-traditional students, specifically.

It is important to note, however, that those who do not possess dominant forms of capital are not at fault for this seeming “lack” of capital. Bourdieu’s theoretical system suggests that it is entirely intentional for educational institutions to value the dominant group’s capital (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1990; Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992). Understanding this devaluation, some scholars have modified Bourdieu’s theory to argue that students from historically marginalized groups also possess these forms of capital, among others, through community cultural wealth, as represented by family, friends, and their larger community (Yosso, 2005). As such, we do not see any of our participants through a deficit lens, but rather one that recognizes how the rules of the field put them at a disadvantage by devaluing their capital.

In summary, Bourdieu’s theory serves as an important framework to explore how post-traditional students are prevented from and ultimately find success in navigating the field of higher education. We argue that the three forms of capital can be acquired and deployed to students’ advantage when aligned with the rules of the field (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992). In other words, students who “lack” valuable forms of capital privileged in higher education may also accumulate forms that help them to navigate the field successfully.

Data and Method

To facilitate our investigation, we employed a basic qualitative design, informed by an interpretivist research paradigm, to understand how participants “make sense of their lives and experiences” (Merriam & Tisdell, 2015, p. 24). Specifically, we sought to understand the experiences of post-traditional college graduates—those who earned a bachelor’s degree after persisting through an extended and interrupted path—by centering the perspectives of the individuals who experienced it. We further describe our study procedure, participants, and analysis in the following sections.

Study Procedure and Participants

Data come from semi-structured interviews conducted as part of a larger study on college graduates who initially enrolled at a four-year institution, earned a bachelor’s degree in six years or longer, and/or completed their degree program at an institution other than the one where they started. Given the specificity of the study’s eligibility criteria, the research team recruited participants widely, primarily through social media. The team began recruitment efforts in the fall of 2019 using a range of strategies, including email announcements and snowball sampling through professional connections, which yielded approximately 15% of our sample. We pivoted to an approach using social media in the spring of 2020 by posting announcements on multiple platforms (e.g., LinkedIn and X, formerly Twitter). Accounts for these sites were created by members of the research team and professional colleagues, including educational scholars and practitioners. The use of social media was a more effective recruitment strategy for this “difficult-to-reach” population (Masson et al., 2013; Palys et al., 2012; Sikkens et al., 2017); however, for this reason, the respondents derive from locations across the U.S. and are not representative of a particular institution or region. Further, participants attended institutions spanning private-nonprofit, for-profit, and public control. We received a large number of inquiries for the study and ended our recruitment efforts after reaching 50 respondents. We initially used a web survey to screen for eligibility based on our inclusion criteria. These efforts resulted in a total of 40 post-traditional college graduates who were interviewed.

Table 1 summarizes the characteristics of our study participants, including socio-demographic background, enrollment trends, and their time-to-degree. Although all of our participants first enrolled at a college or university at a “traditional” age (i.e., 17–19), their ages at the time of the interview ranged widely, depending on their enrollment years and the timing of their degree conferral. A few of our respondents started their college journey before 1990 (12%), but half enrolled as first-time undergraduates between 2000 and 2013. Given the range of enrollment periods, the economic, political, and social contexts of experiences differed across the participants. However, most graduates were enrolled as undergraduates in the early 21^st century, as 93% graduated between 2000 and 2020. Our respondents’ time-to-degree ranged from 6 to 24 years, with an average of 10 years. Notably, most students attended more than one institution (93%); 45% attended more than two institutions, and 32% enrolled at a community college at some point during their college journey, after initially enrolling in a four-year college or university. Despite some differences across the characteristics and enrollment trends of the participants, our study reflects the diverse experiences of post-traditional graduates, the common barriers they faced, and their strategies to overcome them.

Table 1

Characteristics of Post-Traditional Graduates in the Study (N = 40)

Student Characteristics and Enrollment Trends	Percentage
Race/Ethnicity
White	55%
Latinx	7%
Black	20%
Asian/Pacific Islander	7%
More Than One Race	10%
Gender
Female	58%
Male	38%
Non-Binary or Transgender	5%
First in the Family to Attend College (First-gen)	30%
Transfer Patterns
Ever Transferred	93%
Attended More than Two Institutions	45%
Attended a Community College	40%
Initial Matriculation Year at the First Institution
1978–1989	12%
1990–1999	38%
2000–2009	38%
2010–2013	12%
Year of Bachelor’s Degree Conferral
1986–1999	7%
2000–2009	35%
2010–2020	58%
Time-to-Degree (Number of Years)
6–7 Years	33%
8–9 Years	24%
10–14 Years	35%
20–25 Years	8%

One of the research team members interviewed the participants at the time of data collection. These interviews were conducted on a rolling basis and took place primarily over Zoom, although a few were held in person before the COVID-19 pandemic began. Each interview lasted around 60 minutes, and participants received a $25 gift card for their time. Interview recordings were transcribed verbatim by an external service, reviewed by the researchers for accuracy, and de-identified using pseudonyms. We lightly edited quotations presented in this paper for flow. The interview protocol covered participants’ educational experiences in higher education. Topics included their educational histories from high school through their enrollment at various institutions, their encounters with individuals affiliated with these institutions (e.g., faculty, administrators, peers), and their views on their transitions and the overall postsecondary experience. For the current study, we primarily relied on a subset of these questions for our analysis, including the following: What were the biggest challenges? And what strategies did you use to face challenges or hard times?

Analysis and Trustworthiness

To analyze our data, two authors engaged in an iterative coding process using MAXQDA, starting with a set of deductive codes derived from Bourdieu’s (1986) forms of capital. We sought to support the trustworthiness of our findings by employing multiple coders, discussing the findings as a team, and engaging in individual reflexivity throughout the research process (Lincoln & Guba, 1985). Using high-level categories (economic, cultural, and social capital), we independently coded the same two transcripts, inductively generating subcodes to capture specific situations of capital-related barriers (e.g., tuition or housing as economic capital barriers). After completing this initial round of coding, we met to discuss discrepancies and refine our interpretations of capital- and non-capital-related barriers.

With agreement about code definitions, we then split the remaining documents to code individually for the capital-related barriers participants faced and the capital they activated. After coding each transcript, we each wrote a summative memo that captured the most significant barriers the participant faced and the capital they activated, notable interactions of capital, and the arc of their enrollment trajectory. These summative memos helped us make sense of the data and recognize emergent themes by seeing the absence, accumulation, activation, and transformation of capital over time. After completing our separate coding, we met to discuss what patterns we saw within our analysis from either coding or in our memoing.

Throughout this conversation, we returned to Bourdieu’s larger framework to craft our understanding of how the capital and dispositions students needed to navigate higher education spoke to the rules of the field (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992). With an understanding of those rules, we could then offer suggestions for higher education institutions to eliminate those capital-related barriers or better support students as they navigate through them. While speaking to the rules of the field, we do not offer a comparison of class-based differences in our analysis of participant experiences due to the limits of our available data regarding the participants’ social class origin and ongoing discussions about what social class is and how to define it (Lareau & Conley, 2008).

Findings

Our data suggest that post-traditional graduates experience many obstacles to success throughout their complex educational journeys. Notwithstanding the significance of specific issues that some individuals confronted—for example, mental health challenges or family emergencies—we focus specifically on the economic, cultural, and social capital barriers that were highly prevalent in our participants’ trajectories. Our findings reveal that many participants experienced multiple and connected capital-related barriers, and all experienced at least one. We also find that participants usually activated interconnected forms of capital to overcome obstacles en route to a bachelor’s degree.

The complexity and nuance of these capital-related barriers and activations are best understood throughout a student’s postsecondary career. To illustrate this point, we begin our findings section by using the story of one student, Lisa (all participants have pseudonyms), for two important reasons. First, although our research is not a case study or narrative in nature, Lisa’s story helps illustrate a typical trajectory among our participants, which includes a period of initial enrollment, a stopout prompted by capital-related barriers, and eventual reenrollment and completion, enabled by the development and activation of capital. Secondly, Lisa’s story highlights how post-traditional students encounter and navigate capital-related barriers over time, acquiring and activating capital to move toward degree completion. Following Lisa’s story, we examine the more common barriers related to capital our participants faced, the capital they activated, and the interaction of capital therein.

Lisa’s Story

Lisa is a white woman from a small rural Appalachian town who commuted to a racially diverse public high school in a nearby city, which served many students from the surrounding rural areas. She considered herself an “average, but not a spectacular student.” Although her parents did not attend college, they enthusiastically encouraged her to pursue it. She decided in 11th grade that she would go to college, but her family “had no idea how to apply for, and how to get things in line to get accepted to a school.” Lisa’s high school had recently received funding to hire a part-time guidance counselor who helped her find information and apply to colleges. Lisa enrolled in a private liberal arts college in a nearby state in the fall of 2007. Although confident academically, she often felt isolated on campus because “it was a private institution, the majority of people were from upper-middle-class, white backgrounds, and that was just not an environment I was familiar with.” Although white, she could not connect to her peers’ wealth and ease, feeling she did not fit into the campus culture because of her class. She detailed:

All of these things that were really associated with the middle class, that I was just not a part of. And at the time, I had quite a noticeable accent, and so that was also just another thing that [othered] me, and made it difficult to feel as if I was, class-wise, a part of this culture and this environment.

To afford attendance, she had several scholarships and a work-study job but often worried about finances, further leading to her feeling ill-at-ease with her peers who spoke of markers of wealth that were foreign to her (e.g., owning a home or the vacations they took) while she was taking on extra work to make ends meet. One scholarship sponsor withdrew funding at the end of her first year, leaving her short the money needed for tuition for her sophomore year. The financial aid office suggested that her parents cover the next semester while the office worked it out for her, something her parents could not afford, especially after a recent workplace injury left her father unemployed. Lisa decided, “It’s time for me to come home then. This didn’t work out, and it’s time to go to work.” Upon stopping out, Lisa returned home and started two jobs—working as a restaurant server and a grocery clerk—spending the next four years working and saving money. After several years, she began taking prerequisite classes at a community college.

Lisa then applied and was accepted to an in-state public university (PU), navigating the application and credit transfer process primarily on her own. She felt more comfortable at PU because of its economic and racial diversity. Hoping to graduate quickly, Lisa reportedly took 25 credit hours per semester. She continued to work as a server on weekends and became a professor’s assistant after telling her professor she needed another job, which allowed her to stop commuting long distances to one of her jobs. By overloading her schedule, Lisa graduated shortly after starting at PU. With her graduation in 2013, Lisa took six years to complete her degree after initial enrollment.

Reflecting on her trajectory, Lisa’s most significant barriers were the social distance between her and her peers, the “low-grade nausea” of worrying about money, and not knowing how to navigate the college environment. To succeed, she had to learn to “speak to the manager,” which was “not something that [she] was taught to do,” but she learned how with some help. When transferring credits, Lisa recalled the following interaction with a coworker:

Lisa:

“I wanted to go to [PU], but I can’t get in there because they won’t take my grades from my other school.”

Coworker:

“Well, what did you say when they said no?”

L:

“Well, I didn’t say anything. I’ve just gotten the letter from them.”

C:

“Oh, no. You need to call them and tell them that’s not acceptable.”

Lisa’s mother cautioned her, fearing the college would revoke her acceptance if she challenged them. Her coworker told her, “No, you’re accepted. They’re not going to kick you out just because you ask for something. Rich people ask for stuff all the time. You should just do it.” Lisa attributed her persistence primarily to people who helped her, such as her coworker.

Through Lisa’s experience, we see how different forms of capital acted and interacted as barriers to her success. Economic barriers played a key role in her initial stopout. Still, she also did not know how to navigate the financial aid process for additional aid or whom to ask for help, representing a cultural capital barrier as well. Lisa also did not readily have people in her life with that knowledge (social capital), as she was the first in her family to attend college, and college attendance was not common among her hometown peers. Although she had economic capital in the form of scholarships and work during her initial enrollment, this kind of economic capital was precarious. The withdrawal of one scholarship left her without the funds needed to continue, and she could not rely on family support, as suggested by the staff member in her college’s financial aid office. Furthermore, her non-dominant cultural capital and lack of economic capital created a social distance between her and her peers, making her first college experience isolating and making it difficult for her to turn to those campus peers for support.

Lisa’s experience also demonstrates how capital activations helped her ultimately succeed. While working, Lisa activated her social capital by living with her parents to save money and build economic capital, making her later attendance at PU more affordable. Her workplace also provided her access to additional social support (i.e., her coworkers) whose cultural capital she drew on and incorporated into her habitus (i.e., embodied cultural capital), typified by learning to “speak with the manager.” Lisa used her connection with a professor (social capital) to secure a work position that provided her economic and emotional support, as the professor allowed her to work on homework and gave her flexibility to focus on her academics. Furthermore, Lisa relied on expectations (i.e., embodied cultural capital) that she could and needed to succeed in college, which originated with her parents and were reinforced by her other experiences. Although capital barriers made their paths difficult, our participants, like Lisa, showed remarkable ingenuity in activating different forms of capital, especially social capital and the resources it provided, to help them graduate.

Capital Barriers

Our participants’ experiences included various capital-related barriers that ranged in intensity from relatively minor instances (e.g., struggling to connect with a professor) to more extreme experiences (e.g., chronic financial issues leading to stopouts). In our analysis, we identified that each form of capital was experienced as a barrier by at least 75% of participants at some point in their trajectories, with social capital barriers being nearly universal. Below, we present the most commonly occurring capital-related barriers participants faced within each economic, cultural, and social capital category and discuss how they interact. As we reference participants, we provide their matriculation and graduation dates in parentheses for context.

Economic Capital: Losing Aid and the Limits of Parental Support

Post-traditional graduates encountered economic barriers, including challenges with paying for tuition, housing, food, and transportation, some of which led to students’ initial stopouts or slowed their time to completion. These barriers often involved losing aid or other financial support, and were sometimes exacerbated by other capital-related barriers. Reflecting on the most significant challenge to his postsecondary success, Donald (1996/2006) shared:

Money. Finances, hands down. It made decisions on where I could and couldn’t go, whether or not I could stay in school. Most of the times that I left a school was because of financial considerations. And I would have stayed otherwise, but money always held me back.

Donald’s financial hardships predated his initial matriculation in 1996, as he had experienced homelessness while in high school; however, after legal trouble during his first semester, he continued to struggle financially to afford to remain in college. As he explained, if not for those financial challenges, he believed he would have remained enrolled.

Similar to Lisa, several participants mentioned having scholarships or other financial aid but losing access due to unsatisfactory academic progress requirements or other circumstances. As Nancy (1997/2008) explained, “My grades weren’t so good, and once you lose your scholarship, I had the tuition scholarship, but I had to pay for [housing], so I worked two jobs to save up the money and pay for my next semester.” Losing aid could be a significant obstacle for students whose families could not or would not support them, leading some to take on jobs to make up for the difference. However, working many hours could interfere with classes or keep students from connecting with their peers, making it difficult to focus on their college experience. This was the case for Sandra (1996/2003), who found herself commuting long hours between home, school, and multiple jobs to make ends meet due to the high costs of attendance and unaffordable housing near her institution. Because Sandra spent so much time working and commuting, her grades slipped and her social isolation worsened, contributing to her decision to stopout.

Economic barriers were not exclusive to those from low-income backgrounds, as those from more economically privileged families could still struggle with college affordability, especially when parents refused to continue supporting them. Christopher (2003/2017) had such an experience. He struggled to excel in his classes because his father dictated the major he could pursue and had specific expectations about academic outcomes. During Christopher’s fourth year, he recalled his father saying, “If you don’t graduate, I’m not paying for any more school.” Although Christopher had assumed this was a bluff, his father was serious. After this ultimatum, Christopher stopped out and returned home. He explained:

I also feel like I wish I had known just how important the financial aspect of going to college is. I don’t know how to put this. It’s just like, whoever’s paying for your college, whether it’s your parents or your loan holder, they just have so much leverage over you, and I wish I had known how liberating it could have been if I’d just gotten some sort of scholarships, or even just planned better, or even spent couple years working to save money to go to school, and just do it debt free.

Although economically privileged, Christopher’s financial support was not unconditional, which led to his stopout. Like his lower-income peers, accessing financial support to meet the high cost of attendance could prove difficult.

The economic barriers students faced also interacted with cultural and social capital barriers. Participants suggested they did not always know how to follow proper procedures (i.e., a cultural capital barrier) or have the social or institutional support they needed to navigate the financial aid system (i.e., a social capital barrier). After dropping classes, Daniel (1998/2018) learned that he would lose his scholarship. He explained, “You had to have 12 credits every semester and a total of 30 every calendar year. So, I didn’t know that and eventually, after the first year, I received a letter saying that my scholarship was revoked.” Sophia (2007/2017) shared a similar multipronged challenge relating to economic capital when reflecting on the biggest obstacle on her college journey:

I had no financial literacy regarding money. And regarding my tuition . . . I grew up poor. Nobody was cosigning a loan for me. Just not having access to the resources that were necessary was a huge barrier. I had to start school all over again, because I didn’t have money to pay for a debt that I owed.

Sophia needed to transfer institutions after a medical leave, but with an outstanding bill, the institution refused to release her transcript. As she explained, without the knowledge of the process or people to help her get the money she needed, she had to start her degree over. With limited monetary support, financial literacy, or a network of people who could support them, other participants similarly stopped out or had to extend the duration of their enrollment.

Cultural Capital: Misaligned Expectations and Help-Seeking Apprehension

As with economic barriers, cultural capital barriers often lead to missteps or stopouts. Participants’ experiences suggest that these barriers could broadly be grouped into (1) misalignment between students’ embodied cultural capital (i.e., the habitus) and the institution’s (as an organization) expectations of undergraduates; and (2) lack of knowledge or comfort in navigating the higher education system to receive support when it was needed.

For many participants, high school was relatively easy as they could get by without much effort; however, they frequently struggled once they were on campus and given more freedom. Colleges assume that students will be independent and attentive to their learning, leading some students to falter academically. Betty (1979/1986) was one such student who did not understand what was expected of her. She believed she would have benefited from knowing those assumptions, saying, “I wish I had known how much your professors expected you to be responsible for your own education, right? Like, how much it required you to manage your time and get your butt to class.” Betty did not recognize her college’s implicit beliefs about the student’s role in success, leading her to struggle and eventually stop out. Although Betty first enrolled a long time ago, these expectations about college students remain. A more recent student, John (2013/2019), explained how he similarly struggled academically before stopping out. He said, “It was just that the academic part was difficult because the strategies I used in high school didn’t work to the same degree that they had in college. Right? I didn’t really know how to study efficiently.” Without the proper study habits, John began failing multiple classes per semester, and his advisor encouraged him to take a leave of absence.

Participants faced many obstacles that required getting support, including mental or physical health issues, transferring, academic advising, academic difficulties, and financial aid; however, they were frequently unaware of many available campus resources or felt uncomfortable accessing them. Ashley (1978/2002) was critical of institutions not getting information to students because she did not receive needed support when she first enrolled:

I would say that there’s just not enough outreach done to freshmen and transfers to make sure that everyone knows what the resources are and to reach out for whatever they can. We just don’t tell people enough when they start out, because there’s an assumption that people know or are prepared or will speak up . . . some people don’t even know what to ask.

Similarly, Matthew (2010/2016) did not know how to reach out. After taking a weed-out class, he decided to change majors. He explained, “I spent the time trying to find new majors but didn’t really know how to ask for help within that system.” He then enrolled in classes for other majors, feeling aimless after missing the deadline to change his major. Had he asked for support, an academic advisor could have intervened and helped him explore potential majors. Other students who knew of campus support services found them intimidating. For example, Margaret (1997/2003) did not use academic advising, believing the office was “inconvenient” and “impersonal” because she did not “know anybody there.” Further, she felt that if “I had any problems, I should be able to figure them out myself.” Although Margaret knew of these supports, she did not engage with them because she felt she should solve the problems rather than seek support from an impersonal office, a belief she attributed to her high-achieving attitude.

Social Capital: Isolation and Social Distance

Many of the post-traditional graduates in our study experienced social capital barriers in the form of isolation from their peers while on campus and difficult interactions with institutional actors. In some instances, these barriers led to students to withdraw from their institution. This isolation frequently emerged from class differences, racism, and sexism. Donna (1997/2007) discussed her transition to campus, saying:

I did make some friends there, but I felt really intimidated by how smart everybody was, and I felt like everybody was just more prepared and knew more about what to do in college than I did. I had a little bit of an inferiority thing going on, and I was just really homesick. I came back home a lot.

Homesickness exacerbated the sense of social isolation typical for our participants as they attempted to navigate the field, representing an interaction of cultural and social capital barriers. Struggling with social isolation made continuing at the institution difficult, and some students turned to their institutions for support, sometimes with limited success, which we discuss here.

Many participants reported challenges with professors, staff, or administrators and experienced inflexibility or inattentiveness in these interactions. Sandra (1996/2003) found her institution’s support structures unresponsive, especially since she did not represent their typical or ideal student. When seeking help, an administrator granted her a conversation in an elevator between meetings. After explaining to him that she needed help with financial aid because work interfered with classes, “The elevator stops, and as the doors open . . . this guy looks me dead in the eye and says, ‘You can’t work and go to [City University] film school,’ and then walks away.” Sandra left the institution immediately following this interaction. Although colleges and universities encompass a broad social network that students should have access to while enrolled, this access was often impersonal (as for Margaret, mentioned above) or negligent (as for Sandra).

Activating Capital

Post-traditional graduates also activated capital to overcome challenges throughout their complex postsecondary trajectories. Some participants possessed more valued capital when navigating their educational experience and activated capital to avoid barriers altogether. For those whose capital was valued to a lesser extent by the dominant society or had less of it available, further developing their capital was necessary to later succeed. Nearly all participants described activating each form of capital in some capacity, which sometimes necessitated converting capital.

Economic Capital: Familial Support and the Benefits of Employment

Economic capital, whether in the form of support from family or earnings from work, proved crucial to the success of post-traditional graduates. Families, particularly parents or grandparents, provided substantial financial support for many participants, helping to pay for transportation, tuition, and housing, which afforded security for these students as they worked toward their degrees. David (2007/2014) credited familial financial support for his eventual success, saying, “I think a lot of it had to do with family support. Even though my parents didn’t and don’t have a lot of means, my grandparents were well off enough to help with expenses or tuition checks.” The amount of financial support families offered ranged from covering the full cost of attendance to small percentages, helping as they could.

Receiving financial support from families for the initial enrollment period provided an additional cushion for students when they returned from a stopout. Anthony (1988/2001) reflected on this, saying, “Yes, I needed some loans, but I didn’t have any previous loans. I think that also helped in returning to school, especially the expense of returning as an adult.” During his initial enrollment, Anthony’s tuition was covered because his father worked as a faculty member at the university, allowing him to use his parental connection to access financial resources. However, not all participants could rely on this kind of financial support. Other families did what they could, sometimes offering housing for a time, especially after their student’s initial stopout. When returning as adults, significant others (e.g., spouses or romantic partners) helped participants by providing additional income or childcare that may have otherwise kept them from reenrolling. Economic support from families could go a long way for participants trying to figure out their next steps or could be a crucial catalyst in completing their degrees.

Many participants who lacked access to economic support from their families or whose support did not cover the cost of attendance often worked to cover expenses and to save up to return. By working, participants could take time to acquire the economic capital necessary to complete college with less financial pressure. For example, Ashley (1978/2002) needed to save money for college while maintaining her independence from her family. Once she saved enough, she worked a part-time job in the morning and took classes in the afternoon. Eventually, Ashley switched jobs and worked at the university to which she had transferred. While at her final institution, she recalled, “I actually got a job at the university itself. And as a staff employee, I could continue to take some classes while I was there. They actually paid for almost all of it.” Ashley’s time-to-degree was extended because she only took a few classes each semester so that she could work; though, without that work, she could not have afforded to attend. Although few participants had tuition benefits available through their work, many, like Ashley, worked at least part-time to acquire financial capital.

Cultural Capital: Acquiring Bureaucratic “Know-How” and Renewed Expectations

Post-traditional graduates activated cultural capital in different forms, but the primary activation involved embodied cultural capital. Many participants said that the time they took off helped them mature, find their direction, and better reflect the attitudes of a “good” student. More commonly, participants relied on the knowledge they gained about how institutions operate to navigate the challenges they faced, and they activated ingrained expectations to complete a degree as motivation.

Some participants knew how to navigate the bureaucratic hurdles of higher education before arriving on campus initially, or they had access to people who did. For example, when asked about how she could stick to the goal of graduating, Kimberly (2012/2018) explained that her continuing generation status helped:

The point where I did start to get support from my family who had gone through the process before, that was when I started to truly excel. And I know that if you’re first-gen, you don’t even have that. So you’re kind of still trying to figure it out on your own. I think I was able to do what I could because I had support . . . I had family members in my life that knew what needed to be done to get to where I wanted to go. And so whenever I needed anything or had a question, I was able to take care of that through them.

Kimberly attributed her ability to succeed to knowing how to navigate the system with support from her family, which she recognized as something that not all students have access to. Here, Kimberly converted her social network into information, transforming social into cultural capital.

However, knowing how to navigate higher education was a significant initial barrier for most participants. For some, their work experiences taught them the inner workings of bureaucratic systems, providing valuable information they could use when they returned to college. For example, Barbra (1998/2011) recalled not being scared during the transition to her final institution because “I knew I had gained the skills . . . to navigate systems, not necessarily university systems, but just systems in general. So, I had the know-how to navigate the application processes and do the follow-up.” With these skills gained through her work, Barbra understood the nature of bureaucracy, which provided her with confidence and the knowledge to navigate it and ultimately complete her degree.

Most participants also expressed an expectation that they would attend and complete college, which helped them finish. A few participants drew on expectations of the necessity of a degree because of the struggles they saw in their parents’ lives or that they experienced after stopping out. The majority mentioned that parents discussed college attendance from a young age, and they drew on these expectations to stay on track to complete their goal. As Susan (1983/1995) explained:

I think it had a lot to do with my upbringing and the expectation that, eventually, I would get a degree . . . just growing up with that expectation, I think, gives you something to push towards, even if you’re not ready to do it yet; even if that gets delayed.

Susan beautifully captures how the habitus (i.e., embodied cultural capital) can shape behaviors and expectations. She is one of many participants who drew on expectations that college is a must. Expectations can be powerful drivers, and although they may originate externally (e.g., from society, parents, or peers), once internalized, they propelled our participants forward.

Social Capital: Finding Communities of Support

Social capital emerged as a persistent theme, as participants frequently referenced the importance of strong social networks in providing the support needed to continue. These networks included coworkers, family members, spouses, children, parents, siblings, extended family, friends and peers, and institutionally situated employees and supports. Because social capital is tied to other forms of capital and has been discussed above, particularly in the form of family support, this section focuses on the roles of friends and peers and institutional agents, who, according to our participants, were instrumental in their college completion.

Friends and peers were a significant source of support for students on their educational trajectories, providing resources and, most importantly, a sense of community. Strong connections with peers can help positively influence a student’s attitude toward learning or motivate them when things became challenging, connecting to a student’s habitus and sense of group membership. As Patricia (2007/2015) said upon returning, “I always gravitated towards the students who were also working really hard in a lot of these classes. So those students just helped keep me motivated on weeks that I was just running low on motivation.” A strong sense of community also helped participants feel that they could continue toward their degrees and were not failures for stopping out and returning later in life.

Participants also accessed support from people within their institutions. These supports arrived in different forms, including formal programs, professors, staff, or administrators who showed extra care and concern. Emily (2005/2011) joined a multicultural engineering program, which she believed helped her continue her studies. Although she stopped out due to illness and a family emergency, she credits that program for her early successes. She explained that after experiencing a rough transition academically, “Our multicultural engineering program director reached out and said, ‘Hey, we have these scholarships, and this program,’ and I think had it not been for her reaching out, I probably would have dropped out of school, period.” Emily would eventually work for that office and, through connections there and the Women in Engineering Science program, got the support she needed when she did return.

Most participants had at least one story of an institutional employee who worked with them, whether it was something as simple as sharing a scholarship application they thought was relevant for a student or as impactful as checking in on them when no one else was. Participants felt affirmed when institutional actors recognized them as whole individuals with valuable life experiences, rather than dismissing them for not aligning with traditional expectations of what a student should be. This attention was significant for students when they returned at older ages. Through their social capital, participants could access more social, cultural, or economic capital to achieve educational success.

Discussion

Post-traditional students compose a substantial portion of undergraduate students, and yet their success in college, particularly as evidenced by college completion rates, suggests that they are being either underserved or ineffectively served by higher education institutions. Our study offers critical insight into actions that institutional actors and policymakers might take to support post-traditional students, particularly those with an extended time-to-degree, by uncovering the roles that multiple and overlapping capital-related barriers play in hindering and aiding these students on their road to a bachelor’s degree. Recognizing their barriers and subsequent activations tells us more about the rules of the field and how successfully navigating the underlying assumptions and structures of higher education requires access to specific forms of capital.

The Capital to Navigate the Field

Our analyses shed light on how economic, social, and cultural capital barriers emerged throughout post-traditional graduates’ complex trajectories while revealing several broad findings. First, all participants experienced at least one capital-related barrier: Most experienced social capital barriers, and three-quarters experienced economic and cultural barriers. In other words, inadequate access to economic, social, and cultural capital was a frequent hurdle for post-traditional students on their road to a college degree. Our findings support prior literature on how differential access to capital influences college trajectories and experiences (Armstrong & Hamilton, 2013; Goldrick-Rab, 2006, 2016; L. Hamilton et al., 2018; Jack, 2016; McCabe & Jackson, 2016; McDonough, 1997; Mullen, 2010; Stuber, 2011). Importantly, these barriers can also result in an extended time-to-degree as students return to college after initial stopouts. Obstacles such as affording the cost of attendance, navigating bureaucracies, meeting academic expectations, and connecting with institutional personnel remain challenging, regardless of whether one enrolls at 18 or an older age. However, we found that our participants were often better prepared to overcome these barriers when reenrolling.

We also identified interactions between these capital-related barriers. In particular, having limited access to social capital emerged as a dominant challenge for the post-traditional graduates in our study, as those with access to social capital may be able to convert it into other forms of capital, including economic and cultural capital (Bourdieu, 1986). These interactions surfaced in instances where students did not have people in their social network who could have provided much-needed information. For example, many participants described a cultural misalignment regarding academic expectations and how to seek help—a finding that reinforces how students experience a disconnect with authority figures and struggle to navigate the complexities of higher education support structures (Cox, 2011; Jack, 2016; Rosenbaum et al., 2006). With limited support, many of them also described increased adversities following the loss of financial aid, which several studies have found to have a negative relationship with persistence and degree outcomes (LaSota et al., 2022).

Our most notable findings, however, regard how post-traditional students activate forms of capital—by drawing on existing capital reserves or acquiring capital—to overcome the barriers to an undergraduate degree. For example, participants accessed existing cultural capital in the form of entrenched, often familial expectations, but they also acquired cultural capital through their relationships with work colleagues during stopout periods. In their interviews, some participants explained how their upbringing had facilitated the “know-how” required to navigate higher education bureaucracies, but those from less privileged backgrounds often only developed this knowledge at an older age. These findings support the argument advanced by Bourdieu and Passeron (1990) that individuals from marginalized groups can acquire dominant cultural capital, but this process takes time. Thus, navigating colleges is not necessarily intuitive; it requires specific cultural knowledge and dispositions that align with the rules of the field. Our participants’ experiences tell us about the expectations of normative structures that privilege specific dispositions or resources (capital) and how students develop, activate, and convert the capital needed to navigate it. Many of our participants developed this know-how during their stopouts and employed it upon their return to college.

If we interviewed students at a given stage in their educational career instead of those no longer enrolled in a degree program, we would have been unable to observe changes in the role of capital across different points in time. For example, we uncover how acquiring cultural capital during stopout periods, such as understanding institutional processes, enabled participants to reenter college environments with greater confidence and competence. This aligns with research suggesting that cultural capital is not static but can evolve through lived experiences and social interactions (Jack, 2016). Similarly, the interplay between economic and social capital over time was also evident as participants leveraged workplace connections (social capital) to gain critical “bureaucratic know-how” (cultural capital) and access financial support (economic capital) through familial or institutional networks. These processes of activation and conversion reinforce Bourdieu’s argument that capital functions as an interconnected system, with its value contingent upon alignment with the norms of the field (Bourdieu, 1986; Bourdieu & Passeron, 1990). By foregrounding the temporal and relational dynamics of capital, this study offers a nuanced understanding of how post-traditional students strategically navigate barriers and transform capital on their trajectories toward degree completion.

Finally, our findings also demonstrate that as many students transition into early adulthood, the “need for interdependence with others, rather than complete independence from others” is a common experience and a need that persists over time (Settersten, 2015, p. 113). Social capital was critical for our participants, and these social ties were significant both within the institution (e.g., peers or institutional actors) and outside of its walls (e.g., friends, family, and work colleagues). Prior literature has affirmed the importance of social supports in college success (Armstrong & Hamilton, 2013; L. Hamilton et al., 2018; Roksa & Silver, 2019; Stuber, 2011), although these supports are unequally distributed and difficult for some students to build and engage with during college. Nonetheless, it is evident that students do not need to pull away from their communities to persist, as previously theorized (Tinto, 1993). Many of our participants found communities of support from a broad range of individuals, including faculty and staff, their families, and peers (Deutsch & Schmertz, 2011; Yosso, 2005). This study further shows how these supports aid students upon their return, suggesting the value of social capital in navigating college does not diminish as they transition to post-traditional status.

Implications for Practice and Research

Our study offers important insights into the college completion process for post-traditional graduates with an extended time to degree, but it also highlights the need for complementary research about this population. In particular, quantitative studies have the potential to provide an understanding of the factors associated with post-traditional student pathways and the effectiveness of specific interventions designed to better support these students. Important distinctions in student experiences may also occur by social class and other socio-demographic factors that we were unable to fully distinguish in our data. For this reason, more qualitative research that explores differences between groups may allow researchers to better understand how the needs of different types of students align or diverge.

We argue that elucidating the experiences of post-traditional graduates offers a valuable perspective to policymakers and institutional actors who should invest more in helping these students achieve their college completion goals. By acknowledging the increasingly porous nature of the college walls and the complexity and opportunity of that reality, higher education institutions may be better able to help post-traditional students on their paths to college completion. Intentional efforts are needed to ensure students can access support while facilitating opportunities to develop help-seeking skills. Our findings suggest that building strong networks, including institutional agents on campus, peers, and family, can be critical to student success. Through these networks, students can draw on the social capital of both their new and existing communities to persist in their degree programs. These social networks are essential in and of themselves, but they can also help students access other kinds of capital needed to navigate college, such as developing help-seeking skills or learning how to secure and maintain financial aid.

Facilitating the development of “know-how” should be a priority for many institutions to ensure that students are equipped with the competencies needed to navigate the complex systems, processes, and expectations of higher education. However, institutions should also look for ways to eliminate the need for specialized knowledge or attitudes when possible. Notably, other scholars have already advanced possible strategies that institutions might use to support post-traditional learners in these areas (Soares, 2013), including a single point of contact at institutions (Michelau & Lane, 2010). In summary, colleges and universities should reevaluate what students are expected to know, who can assist, and how assistance is delivered.

Reimagining support for post-traditional students will be imperative as the enrollment landscape of higher education evolves. Given a declining number of “traditional” age undergraduates across many four-year colleges and universities (Grawe, 2021; McGee, 2015), there has been increased interest in supporting and reenrolling adult learners, particularly those with some college but no degree (Bird et al., 2022; Ortagus et al., 2021; Shapiro et al., 2019). Doing so, however, will require a better understanding of complex, post-traditional student trajectories and a critical examination of many common assumptions in higher education that often privilege “traditional” age students and those from middle-class backgrounds.