Longevity has quietly shattered that model. As MEA alum Avivah Wittenberg-Cox notes in this Forbes article, we’re now living multi-chapter lives — and higher education is finally beginning to catch up.
Around the world, universities are creating programs designed not for credential-hungry twenty-somethings, but for seasoned adults asking deeper questions: Who am I now? What still wants to emerge? How do I want to contribute in the decades ahead? From Stanford’s Distinguished Careers Institute to new initiatives in Europe and Asia, midlife education is becoming less about reskilling and more about re-imagining. MEA is proud to have helped in the curriculum development of many of these new university programs.
What’s striking is that these programs aren’t primarily focused on productivity. They emphasize reflection, community, intellectual renewal, and purpose. In other words, they honor a truth many midlifers already feel: that wisdom is not a byproduct of age, but something that must be cultivated.
At MEA, we see this every day. When people are given space to pause, learn, and reconnect with their inner compass, something powerful happens. Ambition softens into intention. Achievement gives way to contribution. Curiosity reawakens. I co-wrote a white paper on The Emergence of Long Life Learning in 2020 on this topic and am thrilled to see that we’re seeing progress.
Midlife education isn’t remedial. It’s developmental. It recognizes that the second half of life isn’t a slow fade — it’s a creative frontier. As lifespans lengthen, the question is no longer whether we’ll live longer, but whether we’ll live more meaningfully.
Education, when done right, doesn’t just prepare us for a career. It prepares us for a life well lived — at every age.
-Chip
P.S. We’re proud to see that our two MEA locations – Mexico and Santa Fe – are honored in Travel & Leisure magazine’s annual World’s Best Awards. Four of the 25 top places in the world are in Mexico (San Miguel de Allende is the perennial #1 on the list), more than any other country, and Santa Fe is the only U.S. city on the top 25 list.