{"id":76114,"date":"2025-10-22T10:30:39","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T17:30:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/?p=76114"},"modified":"2025-10-22T13:07:54","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T20:07:54","slug":"william-alger-jacks-on-track","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/william-alger-jacks-on-track\/","title":{"rendered":"He enrolled at NAU in 1973. He graduated 52 years later."},"content":{"rendered":"

You might call <\/span>William Alger<\/span><\/b> the Benjamin Button of academia.\u202f<\/span><\/p>\n

Alger did it backward. He went for his doctorate first. Then, he went back for a master\u2019s. Decades later, the 72-year-old retired health executive is finally graduating with a bachelor\u2019s degree from NAU, more than a half-century after his college journey began.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cImagine someone seeing three diplomas on your wall and they\u2019re in the wrong order: doctorate, master\u2019s and finally a bachelor\u2019s,\u201d Alger said, chuckling. \u201cThat\u2019s certainly going to be an interesting discussion.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

How did this wayward Lumberjack find his way back home after so many years away, becoming one of the oldest graduates in university history? That story\u2019s \u201ca hoot and a half,\u201d Alger said.<\/span><\/p>\n

New heights and snowball fights<\/span><\/b><\/h3>\n

In the 1960s, Alger and his family left their home in San Diego and decamped to Flagstaff for two summers while his father earned a master\u2019s degree in teaching at NAU. Though he was very young then, Alger still remembers staying in the Tri Delta sorority house and playing in the sand near the then-under-construction University Union Fieldhouse.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Woman<\/a>
Alger said his wife and kids (pictured here) poked fun at the fact that he was the only person in the family without a bachelor’s degree.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

After high school, Alger spent one \u201cboring\u201d year at a Southern California university. Recalling those good old days in the high country, he transferred to NAU.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cCampus life was very rewarding for me,\u201d he said. \u201cThere was a lot of activity occurring on campus, unlike at my previous university, and the professors always seemed to enjoy teaching and really cared about their students.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

While studying biology with the goal of becoming a pharmacist, Alger spent his free time playing NAU club soccer, representing Sechrist Hall in dormitory snowball fights and volunteering for the service organization Circle K International, which supported on-campus and community service projects.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOne year I had to play Santa Claus at a senior center Christmas party,\u201d Alger said. \u201cMind you, I was 5-10 and all of 135 pounds. I had to stuff myself with so many pillows that everyone laughed at me when they saw me walking back to my dorm.\u201d One of the revelers was his classmate <\/span>Nancy Serenbetz<\/span><\/b>, now a development director in NAU\u2019s College of Education.<\/span><\/p>\n

Alger got the surprise of his life when, in his senior year, his academic advisor informed him he was two social science classes short of fulfilling graduation requirements.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI was so focused on biology, psychology and chemistry that I didn\u2019t realize I needed two additional social science classes to graduate,\u201d Alger said. \u201cIt was too late to enroll by then, and I didn\u2019t want to pay another year of out-of-state tuition. So I said to my advisor, \u2018Why don\u2019t I take these classes at San Diego State?\u2019\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Back in Southern California, Alger completed one social science class and was in the process of completing the second when the fateful letter came: He\u2019d been accepted to pharmacy school at the University of California San Francisco.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a little-known fact that back in those days you didn’t actually have to graduate to be accepted to pharmacy or dental school\u2014you just had to complete the prerequisites,\u201d Alger said. \u201cThe acceptance rate of people like me is extremely low; 98% of the others in my class had a bachelor\u2019s degree. I just got lucky!\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u2018Pre-grad\u2019 life<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/h3>\n

For a while after that, Alger forgot about his unfinished adventure at NAU. He graduated from pharmacy school, completed a one-year residency and became a practicing pharmacist in the Bay Area. He became fascinated with the business of healthcare and went back to school for a master\u2019s degree in public administration with a focus on healthcare from the University of San Francisco. He worked in leadership positions at several hospitals in northern California over the course of many years, eventually retiring as chief operating officer of a\u202fhospital and affiliated medical foundation in the Sacramento area.<\/span><\/p>\n

After Alger retired, he remembered he had something pending in Flagstaff.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"William<\/a>
Alger, pictured at right with his family, retired at 60 in northern California.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cIn the back of my mind, I thought, \u2018There\u2019s an objective I never achieved, and that\u2019s graduating from NAU,\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cMy kids have been busting my chops for years, stating that I was the only one in the family who hadn\u2019t graduated from college!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Finally, last fall, Alger sent an email to Serenbetz, his old classmate. He asked: What would I have to do to get that diploma? The message wound its way over to <\/span>JJ Boggs<\/span><\/b>, assistant director of enrollment management at NAU. Boggs said Alger\u2019s story warmed her heart.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI love a good challenge, and I knew I had terrific colleagues\u2014like academic advisor <\/span>Teresa Del Vecchio<\/span><\/b>\u2014who would dig in with me,\u201d Boggs said. \u201cIt took months to coordinate staff, faculty and administrators from University Advising, the Registrar\u2019s Office, Admissions Processing, Curriculum and Assessment, the Department of Biology, the Dean\u2019s Office and more to unearth William\u2019s NAU transcript, sort through degree requirements from the 1976 catalog, collect transcripts from other schools, evaluate transfer credit from almost a half century ago, submit and approve the graduation request and process a graduation application. What a team effort it was!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

After a lengthy period of time and multiple layers of reviews, Boggs sent Alger the news that he\u2019d officially graduated from NAU on Oct. 2\u2014his 72nd birthday.\u202f<\/span><\/p>\n

Nothing ventured, nothing gained<\/span><\/b><\/h3>\n

Boggs said Alger\u2019s story may be atypical, but it\u2019s not unheard of at NAU. The university\u2019s <\/span>Jacks on Track<\/span><\/a> program helps people of all backgrounds, from veterans to parents and beyond, achieve dreams deferred. Alger just so happens to be the program\u2019s 200th graduate.<\/span><\/p>\n

Alger said programs like Jacks on Track prove that life is a winding road, taking people to unexpected places on unpredictable trajectories.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI always told my kids that college is an experience that exposes you to different people and perspectives, and it\u2019s a place where you\u2019ll probably evolve,\u201d Alger said. \u201cMost people don\u2019t maintain the same major. I thought I wanted to become a dentist, and I ended up going to pharmacy school instead.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Contained in the retiree\u2019s story is a lesson for his fellow Lumberjack graduates\u2014most of whom are 50 years his junior and have a whole lot more life ahead of them.\u202f<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIf you have an objective you haven\u2019t accomplished yet, you don\u2019t have to forget about it,\u201d Alger said. \u201cYou can just try. Focus. Never give up.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Northern<\/span><\/p>\n


\nJill Kimball | NAU Communications
\n(928) 523-2282 | jill.kimball@nau.edu<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You might call William Alger the Benjamin Button of academia.\u202f Alger did it backward. He went for his doctorate first. Then, he went back for a master\u2019s. Decades later, the 72-year-old retired health executive is finally graduating with a bachelor\u2019s degree from NAU, more than a half-century after his college journey began. \u201cImagine someone seeing…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":95,"featured_media":76148,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-76114","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faculty-staff"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76114","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/95"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76114"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76114\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/76148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76114"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76114"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in.nau.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76114"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}