I know there is SUNY Empire State College but I feel it’s tailored for working adults. I am unemployed (as of last November) and receiving SSI/SSD to support myself but want to go back to college for the BS & MS degrees to get a better paying job and get out of those benefits.
I am looking for any SUNY that has a significant number of students aged between 25 and 50 so I don’t stick out like a sore thumb. I plan to take classes during the days and not just in the evenings/nights or weekends like most working adults do.
I don’t think there is any one SUNY that has a noticeably higher percentage of returning adults other than Empire. If you already have an Associates, Keuka College has an adult-only program called ASAP which allows you to finish with consideration given for work experience. It offers classes across upstate New York at various sites.
Evening classes definitely have a much higher number of non-traditional students. Interestingly, the demand for evening classes is shrinking as online offerings grow, since many working adults prefer online.
The community colleges may have a higher percentage of adults, but it will still be small and the downside to community college is you will be with a lot of not-so-mature students who don’t necessarily even want to be there. As an adult I would find that very frustrating.
I have had one or two adults in the classes that I teach every semester at a SUNY and I never got the feeling that they felt terribly out-of-place. They often take on leadership roles in various organizations and are able to get a lot more out of college than their younger peers.