A return to college for some seniors isn’t quite what you’d expect.
Take, for example, Lester and Odette Stoffel, both 81. The couple doesn’t plan only to attend classes at Benedictine University in west suburban Lisle. The Stoffels also plan to live there, at Villa St. Benedict, a retirement community being built across the street from the school.
“We looked at different retirement communities, but playing golf every day is monotonous,” said Lester Stoffel, a retired library consultant, who lives with his wife in Downers Grove.
So instead of hitting the links, the Stoffels will be hitting the books.
They have fresh student identification cards they can use now, even though their home probably won’t be finished for a couple of years.
And they already have attended their first university-sponsored event, a lecture by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. “We like to be mentally stimulated,” said Odette Stoffel, a retired music teacher.
Wealth of activities
The Stoffels are part of a growing number of senior citizens moving to campus as universities and colleges nationwide build retirement communities.
Seniors can again enjoy college life–the classes, sports activities and cultural events. On-campus elders can interact with students–a good way to energize both generations. Plus, schools often have the top-notch medical facilities seniors want.
“The traditional retirement community provides a lot for the body, but not for the soul,” said Leon A. Pastalan, a professor of architecture at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor who has studied college retirement communities.
Apparently so. College retirement communities have taken off lately. Communities have been built at small schools and big ones. Tiny Oberlin College in Ohio has one–Kendal at Oberlin–and the University of Michigan recently opened University Commons.
There are residential communities for retirees at 47 colleges and universities and 37 more are conducting feasibility studies, Pastalan said in an interview.
“There is more than a passing interest in the idea,” said Pastalan, author of “University Linked Retirement Communities” (Haworth, Binghamton, New York, 1994).
Concept 20 years old
The first college retirement communities were built about 20 years ago.
Indiana University in Bloomington led the way with Meadowood, which opened in 1981 on the campus’ northern boundary. The community–fairly typical of others like it–now has 230 residents who have a choice of housing options from independent apartments to a nursing home.
The retirement communities initially were designed for retired faculty members–administrators felt they should have a way to continue their affiliation with the school–but the concept quickly expanded to include others, such as alumni, friends of the university and retirees from the wider community.
Alumni comprise most of the residents at college-based retirement communities; graduates have a soft spot for their alma mater. A return to college also is a way to revisit happy places and times, college administrators say.
Returning to South Bend
Longtime Chicago-area resident Ted Novakowski graduated in 1957 from Notre Dame University in South Bend, Ind. About two years ago, he and his wife, Dorothy, moved to Holy Cross Village, a new retirement community situated near three South Bend schools: Notre Dame, St. Mary’s College and Holy Cross College.
“I read about Holy Cross Village in the alumni magazine,” said Ted Novakowski, who worked for years as an executive at Sears Roebuck and Co. “So we decided to check it out.”
Novakowski said they initially looked for a community in a place with a better climate than the Midwest. But the couple hasn’t been disappointed.
“This isn’t like a retirement community in Arizona,” he said. “There are 12,000 people between the ages of 17 and 21 and only a few dozen of us over the age of 60. It’s nice to associate with a diversity of people.”
The Novakowskis take classes for free at Holy Cross, a two-year school adjacent to the retirement community. Notre Dame allows them to use the library and athletic facilities. Their grandchildren attend summer sports camps at Notre Dame. And Novakowski has season football tickets for Notre Dame games.
Schools, residents benefit
Alumni and retired faculty will make up about two-thirds of the residents at Oak Hammock, scheduled to break ground this summer at the University of Florida in Gainesville.
“We will have retired bank executives, lawyers and professors,” said Matt Weaver, principal at Asbury Development Management, the project’s Jacksonville, Fla.-based developer. “These people are not brain dead.”
Universities like to help retired alumni. It’s also a way to enrich a school’s endowment.
“You take care of alumni, and they take care of you,” Pastalan said.
He noted that a few colleges have raised millions of dollars in donations from on-campus retirees.
The retirees, though, say they’re the ones who benefit most from a campus community.
Programs at Villa St. Benedict, for example, will encourage interaction between the residents and students across the street. Students in the gerontology program will use the community as a sort of lab to learn more about the elderly. In return, retirees will act as mentors for the students.
“We have a significant number of foreign students who would like to have surrogate grandparents,” said Glenn Trembly, chief executive officerat Villa St. Benedict.
Not every retirement community is owned or operated by the university. Schools sometimes hire private companies to develop and manage the facility.
Even so, the community usually maintains a relationship with the school.
Faculty members often serve on the board of directors at the community.
Healthy relationship
At the University of Florida, 15 of the colleges have signed affiliation agreements with the retirement community being built there.
One college, for example, plans to provide guest speakers; another has designed the exercise center and will staff it.
Most college retirement communities are continuing-care facilities: Several different types of housing are offered, for independent seniors as well as those who need assistance or health care.
Villa St. Benedict will have 303 units, most for independent seniors. Sixty-five are earmarked for those who need assistance. A nursing home will be built later.
Fees can add up
Continuing-care communities on college campuses generally have an entry fee, plus a monthly fee. Because many care for their residents for life, the fees can be high.
Lake Bluff residents Conrad and Ginny Zion recently put down a deposit for a unit at a continuing-care retirement community being built at Stanford University in Palo Alto, Calif. The couple have priority because they are alumni.
“It’s a great idea,” said Conrad Zion, 69, acknowledging that the community is pricey.
The entry fee–90 percent is refundable–ranges from $600,000 to $1.7 million. Monthly fees are $3,100 to $5,600. The second person costs $1,500 a month.
The 388-apartment community is being built by Classic Residence by Hyatt, a Chicago-based developer of upscale retirement communities. Barry Johnson, senior director of sales for Hyatt in Palo Alto, expects construction to begin in spring 2003, with completion slated for January 2005.
Stanford and the retirement community have not formalized any programs yet; it’s too early for that, Johnson said.
But he knows it will happen, he said: “We are creating connections.”
