Meet Sarah Roberts. Roberts is part of a population of students that stands out in a university full of millennials. At 38 years-old with three sons – one that's close to college age himself – Roberts is considered a non-traditional student.
For most college students, college life can be difficult; but for Roberts, balancing mom-life and a professional life on top of college can be even tougher. She has found that she can balance it all with a lot of planning, scheduling and support from friends and family.
“What I really enjoy about Wright State is that I can schedule my classes when my kids are in school and it really helps,” Roberts said. While she already has a degree in nursing, Roberts decided to go back to school full time. In the beginning, she tried to keep her full time job, but the workload was too much to balance with her other responsibilities. Now, she is pursuing an English degree with a concentration in Professional Writing while being a full-time mom and wife.
To keep up with her family’s schedule, Roberts sits down every single night to write a to-do list for the next day.
“Even something as little as picking up a head of lettuce gets added,” she said. Her husband is a firefighter, in the military and owns his own business; so most of the time, Roberts is on her own when dealing with the kids, but she wouldn’t change anything about her life right now.
“We just closed on a house, so we have to deal with getting the old house ready while painting and moving to the new one,” Roberts said. “It’s tough, but in the end the bigger house will work out.”
After asking how the professors treat her, Roberts admits that they treat her the same. Sometimes, they’re even harder on her because of her professional experience, but when it comes to her kids, they’re lenient about emergencies.
"I try not to miss if I’m sick,” Roberts explained. “I try to keep those absences for when my kids are sick – they come first.” With a busy lifestyle, Roberts remains optimistic about her education and home life. It’s clear she loves being a mom and enjoys pursuing this new degree. “If you’re doing something you don’t love doing, you can go back to school,” Roberts motioned to herself, “and I’m proof of that.”
Roberts confessed that sometimes school work gets hard and she feels like giving up, but the support group she has gathered helps her to keep pushing on. Through doing homework with her kids at night, to the community she’s built with the millennials at Wright State, Sarah Roberts knows she has people to fall back on who care about and support her.
