Decades after enrolling in college, a 90-year-old grandmother walked across the stage at Northern Illinois University Sunday – with her diploma in hand.
For Joyce DeFauw, it was a moment she wasn’t sure would ever take place.
DeFauw first enrolled at the campus in 1951, when it was the Northern Illinois State Teachers College. The first in her family to go to college, Joyce thought she would get a teaching degree, but later changed her major to home economics, saying it suited her better, according to an article from NIU.
Joyce attended the college for three and a half years and was a member of the bowling team. One day, she explained, she met a “good-looking guy” at church, and the two later got married.
Afterward, Joyce quit school then life “got kind of busy” for her and her first husband, the late Don Freeman Sr., the article stated.
Joyce had three children before her first husband’s death then spent five years as a widow before marrying her second husband, the late Roy DeFauw. The couple had six children together, including two sets of twins.
Fast forward decades later, Joyce moved into a retirement home and acquired a computer, which she got used to with time. Joyce had resumed pursuing her degree when the pandemic hit. Still, she explained, the isolation and struggles with studying got to her at times.
“A lot of times I would have quit. I almost did,” Joyce said. “There were just too many people who knew about it. I didn’t want to let them down. I quit once and I was like, ‘I don’t want to do it again.’”
Financial issues threatened to bring her journey to an end at one point. But Joyce was able to continue on after being awarded a Project Finish Line Scholarship, which helps students facing financial difficulties in their final semester finish their degree.
Prior to Sunday’s commencement ceremony, Joyce expressed excitement and only shared one concern: that she hopes she doesn’t fall.
“At the village where I live, some don’t really know where they are,” Joyce said. “To be able to do what I’ve done is a blessing… I was given so much.”
