When Constance Puleo of Verona, N.J. wakes up in the morning, she prepares for class like most college students do: she hops in the shower, grabs a quick bite to eat and reviews her homework assignments before driving to her first class of the day.

In fact, Puleo is just like any other typical college attendee – except she’s nearly fifty years older than the rest of her classmates.

Constance Puleo, holding a textbook for one of her classes. Photo by Elizabeth Getman.

At 67, Puleo says the students who attend her school are mostly between the ages of 18 and 22, but that the age gap “doesn’t matter at all.”

“When I get into school, you can see the difference in my age,” she says. “But after awhile, we’re friends. It’s fun. I think the kids are great, too.”

Puleo is not the only senior taking classes with younger classmates. According to the New York Times, senior enrollment increases each year and the nation’s 1,200 community colleges are creating new programs that cater to older adults.

Puleo takes advantage of such programs at the West Essex Campus of Essex County College in West Caldwell, N.J., and plans to graduate with a degree in liberal arts. Before entering the school in 2005, Puleo took preparatory classes for two years in order to pass the college’s entrance exam.

“When I was young, we learned shorthand typing and English and that was about it,” she says. “In math, we learned the basics. So I had to do a lot of prep work. It was a pain in the neck and a lot of work, but I did it.”

Because she cared for her ill parents and married her husband John at a young age, Puleo says she was unable to attend college right after high school.

“You had a choice: you either did this or you did that,” she says. “Females weren’t given the same privileges as men back then. Now there is an unbelievable difference.”