Originally Posted by cavit8
Douchiness knows no age limits. Having been a mature student myself (cough, cough), I've found the best way to alienate others is to assume you know everything by virtue of your time on earth and they know nothing because of same, and then you let them know it. I've had no problems myself, but there was one guy in our class (nicknamed Sven or Svencter) who knew everything about everything. As the oldest guy in the class, he had little in common with the others so it was pretty easy to get socially ostracized anyway. His douchiness just made it more of a public service. Mind you, he was an engineer too (sorry darkmother).
Motivation and a better sense of direction helps immensely as a mature student. Be cool, be yourself, don't struggle to fit in and keep your eyes peeled for undergrads with a daddy fetish.
you pretty much hit the nail on the head there. i must say that a good deal of my impressions of mature students were thus: trying to form a bond with the prof/TA based on the proximity in age, arrogance when talking to the "kids". anyway, lucky for me i've been to university already and i'm headed to college, where there seems to be less of that.
another word of advice to mature students: don't show up in a tweed coat smoking a meerchaum saying "you think that's old? i remember when....".
nice call on the daddy fetish, that had me laughing at work. i guess it's sage advice, better than a girl with mother issues anyway...