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Online Learner Profiles: Mary Lea

Profiles of Real Online Learners

Guide to Online Education > Online Education In-Depth > Meet Real Online Students > Mary Lea, MS in Instructional Design & Technology

At 60, Mary Lea believes she is the oldest student in her classes. She plans to retire from her job in the business office at a large Midwestern university in the next three to five years.

But she won't be ready to devote herself to helping with the family farm full-time, or even indulging in her two hobbies, sewing and quilting. She has designs on a whole new career.

And she is earning her degree online from Western Illinois University to help her prepare. She thinks her master's degree in Instructional Design Technology will take her down an entirely different path.

A Board of Trustees program allowed Mary Lea to earn her bachelor's degree in general studies from WIU as well. A certificate from a professional secretary course netted 30 units that were applied to her degree.

"I took courses and CLEP-ed out of some courses," she explains. "I got notification in the mail that I was a senior! I thought why not finish this up?"

Her two older siblings, both educators, had always encouraged her to go to school. But it wasn't a priority when she graduated from high school. "All I thought about at the time was getting married," she says bashfully. "I actually never dated another person."

She is obviously a woman who knows a good thing when she sees it, and has the tenacity to stick with it. She has been married to the "same great guy" for 42 years. Raising two children, a daughter, 39, who is now a doctor employed with the USDA, and a son, 37, an educator, understandably took a great deal of her time.

In addition, she has always been responsible for the bookkeeping for the family business. "My husband farms for his mother, his brother, and two other people." She saw the necessity to get familiar with computer applications early on.

Her husband, who is tech-savvy, is an early adopter. "When the first home computers came out, he bought one," she recalls. "We took a computer programming class together." That piqued her interest in technology. Still, it would be some time before she began to rely on computers to complete her daily tasks.

"I was 40 years old before I worked outside the farm full-time," the Illinois native says. "When I walked in the door here we had three computers in the whole department." Twenty years later a lot has changed, and Mary Lea has changed along with the times.

Almost all facets are automated now. She scans documents that used to take up an enormous amount of space. Documents that generate checks, deposit slips, credit card statements for 200 campus staff, purchase orders from the art department to the athletic department—all pass through Mary Lea's capable hands.

All original records must be kept for six years. And then permission from the State of Illinois must be sought in order to destroy them.

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