Staying Fit
At 94 years old, Bob Blum recently became the oldest graduate of Keiser University in Naples, Florida.
He first enrolled in college in 1946 but never earned his degree. Instead, he enlisted in the Air National Guard and soon after was activated to serve in the Air Force. He received an honorable discharge in 1953.
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Despite having a successful career after the military, for decades Blum was reminded that his education concluded at the high school level every time he had to fill out job applications and other forms. The nagging feeling never went away and finally prompted him to go back to college to get his bachelor’s degree more than 70 years later.
While he acknowledges that getting a degree in your 90s is “unusual,” he didn’t dwell on his age very much.
“My family thinks this was the greatest thing since mashed potatoes,” Blum said about his accomplishment. “But I did not start this for anyone but me.”
Learning in a modern world
Because all of his classes were online, Blum had to ramp up his technology skills quickly. He credits his wife, Connie, for helping him learn programs like PowerPoint, Excel, Word and Outlook, which he said was the hardest part of his undergraduate studies.
“I could have never done this if it weren’t for the fact that my wife helped me with the computer. She’s a computer guru,” Blum said. “I would have to yell, Connie, very often during the daytime and she’d have to come in and help me correct the computer.”
Despite the learning curve, he said an unexpected benefit of taking classes online was that his instructors were from all over the country, including a doctor from Syracuse University and a superior court judge in San Diego.
