Woman Dreamed of Becoming a Teacher, but Officials Stood in Her Way After She Got Pregnant. She Just Earned Her Degree at 88

Decades after she began her coursework to become a teacher, an 88-year-old woman has finally received her degree.

On Sunday, May 11, Joan Alexander was honored at the University of Maine’s commencement ceremony. Her daughter, Tracy Alexander, and granddaughter, Isabel Beck, were there to represent Joan, who earned a Bachelor of Science in Education, the school said in a press release. She is most likely the oldest undergraduate degree recipient in the university’s 160-year history.

President Joan Ferrini-Mundy said in a speech during the event that Joan’s story “characterizes what the Black Bear spirit is all about.”

Joan’s degree was years in the making. In the late 1950s, she was a student at the university and dreamed of running her own classroom one day. But Joan was prohibited from student teaching because she was pregnant with her first child, according to the university.

Originally slated to graduate in 1959, Joan went on to raise her four children with her husband, Jim, who was a member of the U.S. Coast Guard. When he was deployed, she was left to raise their four girls. She was also an active volunteer.

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Joan told the school that having a degree was important to her.

“My parents did not complete college, so this was important to me,” she said. “My husband and four daughters have their college degrees, so I was the only one amongst my husband and daughters who had not received a college degree.”

That all changed when her youngest child, Tracy, reached out to the university’s College of Education and Human Development.

Justin Dimmel, associate dean of the college, helped find a path forward so Joan could finally receive the degree she’d worked so hard for. Joan had already completed all of the coursework required at the time, according to the school.

In the early 1980s, she also met the student teaching requirements when she worked as a full-time aide for a preschool program in Southwest Harbor. The college recognized that experience as equivalent to the student teaching she wasn’t allowed to complete two decades earlier.

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“I was moved by Joan’s story and was excited to do whatever it would take to ensure that she would be recognized for the work that she did, both as an undergraduate at the University of Maine and throughout her life,” Dimmel said in the release.

“Joan’s commitment to completing her undergraduate education was inspiring to me, my colleagues and the graduating class of 2025,” he added. “Working with Joan, her daughter Tracy and Joan’s family has been a highlight of my academic career.”

For Joan, it was a huge accomplishment that she’d long yearned for.

“I didn’t realize that it would mean so much to me, but I now feel that a hole in my heart has been healed,” she said.