The Benefits of Going Back to School as an Adult to Boost Your Career

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No matter what age you are, you’re always going to be learning. But if you feel like your career is in a bit of a rut, it could be a good idea to consider going back to college. It might seem like a bit of a backwards step to start with, but because of what you gain from it, the end result will be like taking three steps forward.

Of course, going back to college as an adult, rather than straight out of high school is going to feel completely different, no matter what age you are. But different doesn’t mean that it will be harder, as the name suggests, it can just feel a little different. You might already have a baseline of education under your belt, so it could just be a case of furthering your skills and increasing your knowledge. This is so you can go back and go for the career that you want. Additionally, you may find college easier in a lot of ways when you go with a more mature head on your shoulders. So here are some of the reasons why going back to school as an adult, can be a really good idea for you!

Work Experience

When you’re going back to school after having some kind of career, you have some real life work experience that you can draw from. Plus, you’ll be better able to apply some of the things you’re learning about into a real world settings (that your younger counterparts may not be able to). You will already have an idea about things like collaborating at work and will find it easier to collaborate with others on your course when needed.

More Programs Available

If you went to college when you were right out of high school to get a bachelor’s degree, then that could be ten or more years ago. Think of how much the world has changed since then. As a result, there could be a whole host of programs that are now available to you that weren’t before. From blogging and marketing, to digital degrees, and things like the Master of Management in Library and Information Science degree at USC;there are plenty of options to choose from. You could start from scratch with a more relevant bachelor’s degree that you want, or move on with a master’s degree to give your preferred career a boost.

RELATED: How to Plot Your Career Path Through Further Education

Better Time Management

When you’re back to school as someone more mature, you will have done the living from home thing and there won’t be that angle of college as much for you. Don’t get me wrong, you can still have fun. But you are going to be much better at managing your time and using your time wisely than you might have been at college the first time around (if you have already been before). You are likely to procrastinate less, simply because you have a routine in life, you may have children or other commitments, so you will use your time better and get things done when they need to be. Which is always going to be a good thing in college.

End Goal in Mind

If you go to college later in life, you will have had to take a pay cut to be there, or will be working alongside studying. As a result, you will not want to hang around wasting time. So similar to the point above about using your time wisely, you will have the end goal of graduating in mind. You won’t want to take years and years to get it all done unless that is really necessary. You will have the graduation in mind, so that you can get back into the world of work and doing all that you need to do.

Grow Your Network

Attending college with other working adults will give you an opportunity that you wouldn’t have realized or known about before. It will give you the chance to learn from others around you, and help expand your network. What’s great is, you can keep that network with you and use in your career as you excel. You might even be inspired by these people and their stories, but you are also likely to meet people that can help you on the career ladder with new prospects and contacts.

Online Degrees

The chances are that you will have other commitments when going back to study as an adult, or things like a mortgage to pay. So if you will be working as well as studying, there is the good news that a lot of degrees can be completed online, with maybe one or two days on campus or for assessments. So don’t think that you’ll have to drop everything to go back to college. You can do a degree online and based at home if needed.

On a similar note, although earning a degree a little later on in life as an adult can be challenging, the people at University know this, and know that you have other responsibilities. So there will be more flexible options for you, whether that means working online for the most part, as well as flexibility with deadlines if you have a work commitment on the same day.

You might want to go back in order to change careers or you might want to stay in the current career sector that you are in. Just with a boost that you’ll have more knowledge and expertise under your belt. If the latter is the case for you, then you will already have a stellar knowledge surrounding the subject matter, and this could help you to engage more in the classes and lessons. As well as mean that you are more likely to succeed at work from day one.

Until next time ASSASSINS. . . Stay Disciplined!

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