A first-year online ODU graduate student shares eight honest lessons from his first semester back in school after 20 years away, from protecting study time to using the resources you're already paying for.
Editor's note: The author, Jonathan Heeter, is a senior content marketing strategist with ODUGlobal. He started working at the university in June 2023, and enrolled in the online MLIS program in January 2026.
Twenty years had passed since I'd sat in a class, written a paper or worried about a due date. Two decades since I finished my bachelor's in journalism and walked off to build a career—first as a reporter, then in higher education communications. These days, my job is telling the stories of ODU's online students: who they are, why they came back, and what they're chasing.
This January, I became one of them.
I'm a first-year student in ODU's online Master of Library and Information Studies program, and I just finished my first semester. I won't pretend I wasn't nervous. When you've been out of school almost as long as some of your classmates have been alive, you start to wonder if the academic part of your brain still works.
It does. Here's what that first semester taught me.
Your experience isn't baggage. It's an advantage.
The fear I carried in—that I'd be behind, rusty or out of place—turned out to be the opposite of the truth. Twenty years of working gave me context, real examples and a point of view that I could bring to the work. When a discussion turned to how information moves through an organization, I'd lived it. If you're coming back after time away, that time isn't something to apologize for. It's the experience that makes your contribution worth reading.
Find a system, any system, and stick to it.
Nobody is going to hand you a printed syllabus and walk you through it. As an online student, you're the one keeping track of what's due, what's coming and what you've already turned in. It doesn't matter whether your system is an app, a paper planner or a single running document. I use the Apple calendar on my computer and the Notes app for weekly breakdowns. What matters is that you have one and you trust it.
Protect one consistent study block like it's a meeting you can't miss.
This was the biggest difference between a smooth week and a stressful one. Not how organized I was, but when I studied. I picked regular windows—Monday and Wednesday nights and Saturday and Sunday mornings—put them on the calendar and defended the time against everything else trying to fill that space. Studying around a full-time job and a full life only works if the time is already claimed before the week starts pulling at it.
Get comfortable with the tools before you need them.
Each program is going to have different tools, but you’re definitely going to use Canvas, the learning platform. I had to regularly use ODU’s library databases and a custom Wix website. Spend an hour with each of them early, while the stakes are low. An afternoon of poking around at the start of the semester saved me from troubleshooting at 11 p.m. the night a paper was due. The technology is there to help you. It only feels like an obstacle when you meet it for the first time under pressure. I watched as classmates struggled and scrambled to adjust to new systems the week they were due.
Use the resources you're already paying for.
Online students sometimes assume the support stops at the screen, but it doesn't. The library, the writing center, advising, tech help—all of it is built for you, and most of it is included. Asking for help early isn't a sign you're struggling. It's a sign you're using the place the way it was designed to be used.
Go to office hours, even when you don't have a question.
Office hours are easy to skip when you're remote and busy. Don’t let those be excuses. I started showing up just to introduce myself and talk through where I was headed, and it changed the whole experience. Your professors are far more than a name on a screen, and when they know who you are, everything—feedback, flexibility, maybe even a recommendation down the road—gets easier. Let them know you.
Get to know your classmates.
Online doesn't have to mean alone. The people in your courses are navigating the exact same deadlines, the same readings and the same juggling act you are. Reply to a discussion post like you mean it, or connect with a classmate through Canvas to let them know you valued their opinion. The classmates I connected with became the people I checked assignments against and vented to when the week was long. That network is one of the most valuable things you'll build, and it won't build itself.
Get ahead whenever you can.
Some weeks give you a little breathing room. You should use it. Reading next week's material early, or starting a paper before it's assigned, doesn't just lighten the load down the line. Getting ahead gives you a cushion for the weeks when life refuses to cooperate. And in a busy semester, life always finds a week to refuse to cooperate.
It really is never too late.
You might be sitting where I was a year ago, wondering whether you've waited too long, or whether the part of your brain that does this still works. I'll tell you what I'd tell anyone whose story I get to write: it works, and it's not too late. The journey toward your degree looks different at 40-something than it did at 20, shaped by everything you've done since. That's not something to overcome but something to use.
At ODUGlobal, programs like mine are built for people coming back, starting over and fitting a degree into a life that's already full.
