Since the end of World War II, the number of returning college students aged twenty-five years or older has increased so rapidly in American colleges and universities that college administrators, either through lack of interest and understanding or through failure to function as proactive change agents, have not kept pace with the needs of older student populations. In recent years, as enrollment among traditional younger students has declined, enrollment among mature returning students has grown to the extent that they presently constitute more than a third of all college and university students in the United States. As a result of findings obtained in the study, the following recommendations are offered for consideration; (1) institutions of higher learning should place major emphasis upon development of Services and Programs for Returning Students; (2) colleges and universities should give greater priority to orientation program(s) for returning students; (3) returning students should be given credit for life experience and independent learning; (4) financial resources for returning student services should be standardized as line items in the institution's budget; (5) existing programs should be evaluated in order to determine their effectiveness; and (6) a follow-up study should be conducted in five years to provide statistical data for trend analysis.

The study collected information about training practices in local churches of the United Brethren in Christ. A mailed questionnaire was used to collect data from 230 churches nationwide. The instrument contained 22 questions, divided into three sections: (a) teacher involvement in religious education, (b) teacher training, and (c) demographic information. The return rate was 65.7% (151 surveys). Frequency counts and percentages were obtained. Data were summarized in table and narrative form. Cross-tabulations were completed between selected demographic variables and the provision for teacher training.Selected findings included: (a) among 15 possible religious education activities, at least two-thirds of the churches reported using teachers in five of them; (b) over half of the churches (51%) provided some form of training; (c) among those providing some form of training the scope was limited; (d) difficulty in scheduling and lack of fiscal resources were identified as the greatest obstacles to training; (e) training was more common in churches with larger attendance figures for worship and Sunday school.The following conclusions were formulated: (a) the extent to which teachers were used in religious education activities was affected by the scope of programs offered; (b) in the absence of a mandate for training, scheduling and scarce resources were negative factors; (c) even in churches conducting training, the activity was not a high priority; (d) reliance on consultants and conferences reflected the fact that churches did not conduct theirfor pastors to require training; and, (f) training occurred more often in larger churches where adequate resources and formal approaches to programming were common.Six recommendations were presented: (a) the denomination should develop and disseminate a position on teacher training; (b) pastors should be exposed to educational programs stressing the importance of training teachers; (c) the denomination should formulate and make available more programs and materials to support training; (d) the issue of effectiveness of training programs should be examined; (e) research on the selection, supervision, retention, and evaluation of teachers should be conducted.own training; (e) using volunteers made it more difficult / Department of Educational Leadership