A 90-year-old Illinois great-grandmother became a college graduate on Sunday. Walking across the stage to receive her college degree from Northern Illinois University was a moment 70 years in the making for Joyce DeFauw. She first enrolled in what was then Northern Illinois State Teachers College in 1951.
… DeFauw started out as an early elementary major, then home economics and then took German, typing and bookkeeping. She married and left school. After her first husband died she re-married and raised her family. In all she had nine children. As life happened, she never forgot about school. But in 2019 she decided she had the time and reenrolled at NIU. She completed her classes online from the retirement community where she lives in Geneseo, Illinois.
… At 90 years old, DeFauw received her bachelor’s degree in general studies.
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