LaVerne Autagne delayed earning her college degree for two decades. Now she can't bring herself to stop learning. The 68-year-old has taken classes such as Al Esbin's Religion: A Historical Perspective and Sharon Proehl's Creative Writing. Will the courses - in the familiar phrase of parents worried their children are not practical enough when it comes to majors - "lead to anything"?
Who cares? "I'm just going to be a perpetual student," she says. "The curiosity is just never sated."
She's done all her coursework, and more, through the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI) at UNLV. Part of a network of institutes around the country, the UNLV institute was funded by a gift from the Bernard Osher Foundation. It provides intellectually stimulating programs for people over 50 who want to stay active and keep their minds sharp - in short, for people like LaVerne Autagne.
"I've looked for lifelong learning programs all along," she says. "When I got to Las Vegas, I looked for it again, and this is the best group I've ever found. It's a wonder to me that more people don't know about it."
Nevada, with its dry, sunny climate and lack of state income tax, has long been a prime destination for retirees. Autagne found her way to Las Vegas in 2000, when she and her husband, Tom, moved here to be with one of their two daughters. When he died of liver cancer in 2005, she says, "I knew I needed an outlet. I went in and joined (OLLI) immediately."
UNLV's programs for senior adults don't just operate in the classroom. The Division of Educational Outreach offers excursions at discounted rates to interested seniors. A year ago, Autagne jumped at the chance to raft the Colorado River with a group of 20.
The 300-mile trip from Lee's Ferry, Ariz., to South Cove at Lake Mead took eight days. They stopped twice a day to hike and set up tents at night. Autagne was the oldest one on the trip. She couldn't get enough of it.
"I climbed rocks. I hiked open areas. You bathed in the river. The guides set up Port-a-Potties," she says. "It was absolutely the trip of a lifetime."
So you don't need to convince Autagne that OLLI and programs like it are a worthy investment. She's sold. "This gives retirees a chance to get back into peer groups, keep expanding their minds, maybe start learning skills they've never tried before," she says. "The value is in keeping people alert and active and knowing there's still a purpose to their lives."
