Introduction
Writing brings us to the crossroads of insight and memory .…
Don DeLillo, Falling Man
The Harvard Institute for Learning in Retirement (HILR), one of the pioneering educational experiments for older adults, was founded in 1977 as part of the Harvard Division of Continuing Education. Presently, there are approximately 550 members. We teach each other in full-or half-semester weekly seminars led by a member who is the designated study group leader. During the spring semester 2009 individuals or teams of
members led 56 study groups.
The educational model features liberal arts topics enriched by the broad interests of people who are integrating a wealth of personal experience. In
addition to the study groups, members conduct topical discussions, offer presentations, and also lead various special activity groups. Scholars outside
the Institute offer occasional lectures.
Administration consists of a paid director, who is an assistant dean, and three assistants. An elected council of members makes policy decisions. Members participate in a range of committees related to policy, administration,
admissions, technology, finance, teaching and learning, curriculum, and long-range planning. Membership is by admission because there are more candidates than our community and facilities can accommodate.
The curriculum is rich, vigorous, and varied. There is particularly great demand for study groups on literature, history, and contemporary societal issues. Some members lead study groups in the areas in which they had professional expertise. Others prefer teaching new topics, demonstrating the interest of the older adult in continued learning. For example, a physician might offer a study group on medical ethics, Islam, or the physics of music. Most study group leaders choose not to lead the same study group more than once or twice, illustrating again their thirst for new adventures in learning.
Until the last four or five years, study groups on aging were not common. There was a conscious reluctance to have courses or discussions on aging. The assumption was that people were not interested in studying these topics. Beginning in the fall of 2005, that attitude began to change dramatically to the benefit of all. The Curriculum Committee initiated open discussions about potential study groups in various disciplines, including one that became “Conversations on Aging.” This open-ended process (a description of which can be found in “The Culture of Aging”) led to the formation of subgroups, one of which wanted to design and implement research on the strengths and limitations of this stage of life.
New Pathways for Aging evolved from that initiative. Originally, the five of us sought to answer two questions:
- What does an examination of our current lives reveal,often unexpectedly, about this stage of life?
- How does HILR facilitate a positive transition from work to retirement?
We focused on ethnographic and qualitative research, beginning with ourselves, and wrote personal narratives with the aim of identifying patterns that could be the basis for further inquiry at HILR and beyond. With the guidance of Maurice Stein, we decided this case-based research could lead to a fresh and nuanced understanding of the learning-in-retirement movement and its effect on the lives of older adults.
The results turned out to be much richer than we anticipated. The narratives were quite diverse, as each of us examined defining moments leading into retirement, the issues relating to transitions, our individual
approaches to learning and teaching, and various ways the HILR experience enriched and supported us.
We learned to value the experience of writing itself, particularly in a group where we were able to share our drafts and comment on each other’s work. We developed a rewarding intimacy that stimulated further thought
and sharing, and now consider this process an essential component of our model. We found several major themes in our narratives: identity, aging and mortality, leading and learning, organization, and community.
We published our five essays in a 2007 monograph and held open meetings with the membership to discuss our work and conclusions. Many members became intrigued with the themes and the concept of writing personal essays. We assisted in the formation of writing groups and recruited members to submit their work.
For the publication of New Pathways for Aging, we drew on four new writing groups, interviews with several members, and individually submitted essays to add to our (slightly revised) five essays. While our original group focused on the issues surrounding retirement, many of the new contributors used an autobiographical frame of reference to write more broadly about aging.
After analyzing the contributions of now 27 HILR members, we recast and expanded the themes into chapters on “Identity,” “The Culture of Aging,” “Leading and Learning,” “Community,” and “Living with Mortality.” The narratives were not written to exemplify any one theme and are as multidimensional as the experiences of their authors. An essay written by an editor precedes each collection of narratives, and though the essays focus on a single theme, the narratives generally portray more than one. We end with a conclusion and an invitation to join us. What began as individual quests for meaning has become an institutional conversation and exploration of what it means to grow older. All the contributors to New Pathways have discovered the value of writing as a means of gleaning insights from their recollections of the past.
We hope that readers will be similarly inspired to confront the realities of aging in a thoughtful and mindful manner, and that you will learn as much as we did when you come to the crossroads of insight and memory.