For the past 24 years Sara Thornton has been a weather presenter on the BBC, appearing on our TV screens. But, like many people in their 50s who have had a long career, Sara, 51, says she feels like she has been treading water at work.

With her two children grown up, she’s decided it’s time to get some excitement back into her professional life. Sara will be heading back to the classroom to study acting full-time from September – a first step in her hoped-for new career as a professional actor.

She says: ‘The BBC was my first job out of university in 1997 and I’ve been a weather presenter since 2002. Although it’s a lovely job, for the past five years I haven’t had any adrenaline, nor a sense of progression.’

Sara beat fierce competition to secure a place at Drama Studio London, in Ealing, where she will study towards a master’s degree in professional acting. She says: ‘My heart is beating faster for the first time in years. It feels amazing but scary and daunting.’

A growing number of people in their 50s and 60s, like Sara, are becoming students later in life.

Many UK universities offer part-time or postgraduate courses tailored to mature learners, while some institutions help experienced people who want to change direction. For example, charity Now Teach helps people to turn their years of career experience into a teaching career.

For the past 24 years Sara Thornton has been a weather presenter on the BBC, appearing on our TV screens

For some, becoming a student can help manage career burnout and fulfil a lifetime ambition, but for others, upskilling can lead to new money-making opportunities.

In Sara’s case, she hopes the leap into the unknown will address all three of these. She is launching a podcast called Drama School At 50, which she hopes to monetise.

A financial bridge to retirement

There is a popular idea circulating on social media that if you’re fed up of work but still want to keep mentally sharp and retain a sense of purpose, becoming a student can be a financial bridge to retirement.

The sell is that you can learn more about a topic you’ve always been passionate about and use student finance to support yourself for a couple of years until you can take your pension.

Students who are under 60 on the first day of their course qualify for standard undergraduate maintenance loans, which can typically pay between £4,000 and £15,000 a year, depending on location and circumstances. They can also get a loan to cover tuition fees of up to £9,790 a year.

In England, anyone with a household income of £25,000 or less can get the maximum maintenance loan. Its size falls on a sliding scale down to a minimum of £4,013 for students whose household income is between £58,387 and £62,347, depending on where they live.

Those under 60 with an undergraduate degree can get a master’s loan of up to £13,206 towards the course fees and living costs. Sarah Coles, head of personal finance at investment group AJ Bell, says: ‘Generally, students are only able to receive student finance for one undergraduate degree, so you can’t go back and do another at the same level and receive funding. This is true even if your first degree was paid for without government loans.’

This applies to Sara, who already has a BA and a postgraduate diploma. But she still qualifies for a master’s loan. She is mulling whether to fund the £16,500 cost of the degree herself from her savings, or to take the loan, which will cover some of that fee but no living costs.

But it will be a challenge as she will have to cover the cost of commuting into London from her home in Amersham five days a week to go to class. She says: ‘It’s not just funding the course, it’s also the loss of income.’

If you’re 60 or over and doing an undergraduate degree, you can still get a tuition fee loan but you can’t get a maintenance loan, although you may qualify for a means-tested special support loan of £4,582. However, from January 2027, new rules will require applicants to be under 60 years old on the first day of their course to be eligible for a tuition fee loan.

Sarah says: ‘The BBC was my first job out of university in 1997 and I’ve been a weather presenter since 2002… For the past five years I haven’t had any adrenaline’

Coles says: ‘Any maintenance loan will depend on the income of the household including your partner’s earnings, and income from property, savings or investments.’

But if you’ve never done higher education before, you could potentially qualify for undergraduate student finance for three to four years, followed by further funded study, such as initial teacher training via a Postgraduate Certificate of Education (PGCE). Tax-free bursaries and scholarships of up to £31,000 are available for priority PGCE subjects, including chemistry, computing, mathematics and physics. Those specialising in modern languages can secure scholarships of up to £22,000.

There is a chance graduates may have to repay part of the student loan but there are ways to manage your income through retirement that mean most people will only ever pay a very small fraction of the loan back. Student finance repayments don’t end when you get the state pension. Coles says: ‘Repayments work in the same way as they do when you’re younger, so in England if your income is over the £25,000 a year threshold you will repay until 40 years after graduation.’

If a mature student expects to earn a large income in their new career after graduating, this means they will have to make some repayments on their loan but, by retirement, their income is likely to drop back down.

Take someone who takes a student loan out in their mid-50s for a £9,790-a-year undergraduate degree that lasts three years. If they started earning £60,000 in their new line of work at 60, they would pay £262.50 a month – £3,150 a year – towards their student loan. If they paid this for five years until they retire at age 65 and then take an income of less than £25,000 from their pensions, they would have paid back just £15,750 – a little over half the amount they borrowed, and none of the interest that would have accrued.

In many cases, retired couples could manage their finances in a way so that the spouse without a student loan takes a larger pension while the recent graduate may choose to take a smaller income and remain below the repayment threshold.

And many lucky mature students will never have to pay back a penny, as we explain later. This is because they will never get a large enough income in retirement to exceed the £25,000 earnings threshold above which you have to start repaying your loan.

Carl Green, financial planning director at Evelyn Partners, explains: ‘A mature graduate who is confident they will never earn above £21,000 per year – the repayment threshold for a postgraduate loan – or more than £25,000 for an undergraduate degree, may in theory never make any repayments.’

On death, any outstanding balance is written off and, crucially, it does not pass on to the individual’s estate.

Do what you love 

After working with young children for 20 years, 13 of those as a kindergarten teacher, Rebecca Mihill was ready for a change.

In 2024, at the age of 55, Rebecca completed an undergraduate BA degree in 3D creative practice. She now has a new career as an eco-friendly jeweller, working with recycled silver, enamel and sea glass, to make necklaces and earrings.

She says: ‘My friend wanted her husband to do a degree because you can get a loan and that put the thought into my head.’

In 2024, at the age of 55, Rebecca Mihill completed an undergraduate BA degree in 3D creative practice. She now has a new career as an eco-friendly jeweller

Rebecca says she feels fortunate to have taken the full tuition and maintenance loans available, which added up to a total £51,534. She says: ‘It’s a win-win – if you earn over £25,000, you pay it back and if you don’t, you don’t.’

Rebecca doesn’t expect to make a large income and therefore may never have to pay the loan back.

At the end of the second year of her degree, Rebecca switched her course hours to part time to launch her jewellery business, while she still had some funding. Now she works part time as a gardener, too.

‘I’m 57 now and it’s important for me to do something I like,’ she says. ‘If I could get funding, I would educate myself into retirement.’

Rebecca and other mature students say studying in a new field is a huge commitment that gives you a new social circle and a focus on a cheaper lifestyle.

From vet to artist

After a 35-year career as a vet, Lisa Foster is now creating stunning works of art at York College University Centre in the second year of her BA graphic and communication design studies. Lisa, 59, says: ‘Nobody believed I would stop being a vet. But I had no time for anything else. I’d wanted to do art for ages.’

Lisa, who has a 17-year-old son, is funding the tuition fees of £7,200 a year herself from her savings because she already had an undergraduate degree from her youth which meant she didn’t qualify for a further loan.

But she says: ‘If I wasn’t doing it, I could have spent far more money doing other stuff, for example travelling, lunches out with friends or on clothes and nails.’

After 35 years as a vet, Lisa Foster is creating works of art at York College University Centre in the second year of her BA graphic and communication design studies

If you’re considering a degree in later life and have the money available, you might question if it’s worth paying the fees upfront or if you should take out a student loan.

Anyone taking out an undergraduate loan in England today will be on what’s known as a ‘Plan 5’ loan. Repayments are set at 9 per cent of taxable income above £25,000, with any remaining balance written off after 40 years, or on death if sooner.

Coles says: ‘If you are planning to retire on the state pension alone, or the state pension and a small private pension income, you might fall below the earnings threshold for repayments, so you would stop paying your debts once you hit state pension age.’

But if you expect to receive income from a private pension that would exceed the repayment threshold, you could be paying the loan off for the rest of your life.

For example, if you expect to have an income of £30,000 a year in retirement, you would pay 9 per cent on the £5,000 you earn above the £25,000 threshold – a total of £450 a year in repayments.

If you’re still on a relatively modest income, the fact some of it goes to pay your student debts could hit hard. Wealth advisers say going into retirement with a debt hanging over you is far from ideal at a stage of life when simplicity and financial security matter most.

Drawing a large income from pensions could result in a form of double taxation – where the individual pays income tax and student loan repayments.

Green says: ‘This could open them up to an effective marginal rate of up to 51 per cent for the very highest earners following a postgraduate course or up to 54 per cent for an undergraduate degree.’

This is because additional rate taxpayers, who earn above £125,140, will pay a tax rate of 45 per cent on the top slice of their income plus 9 per cent towards their student loan for an undergraduate degree or 6 per cent for a graduate one.

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Wealthier people need to weigh up whether it is worth funding study out of their investments.

Ollie Saiman of wealth manager Six Degrees, says: ‘For many people in their 50s, taking the student loan and keeping capital invested could make more sense – particularly if the loan functions more like a graduate tax than conventional debt, and there’s a realistic chance part of it may never be repaid.’

If the returns you would have made on your investments outstrip the interest on your loan, you could be better off even if you end up repaying it all. But there are no guarantees in investing, so you could end up worse off.

However, some argue that knowingly taking out a loan you never plan to repay is ethically questionable. Ed Wood, financial planning director at wealth management firm Rathbones, says: ‘Beyond the financial considerations, there is a genuine moral question.’

He thinks borrowing with the expectation that the debt will be written off and effectively covered by other taxpayers sits uncomfortably with the spirit of the student loan system.

But those who have taken the leap and started their studies in their 50s say it has given them a new lease of life. Rebecca and Lisa both say that studying at a mature age requires a huge amount of commitment, energy and emotional support from family and friends.

Sara is feeling positive about starting her course in September. She says: ‘I’ve been put in a Facebook group with my future classmates and seen someone who is in her 20s and half my age, but no one has ever said “you are too old for this”. I’m not seeing myself as a top Hollywood actor – I’m just doing it to scratch the itch.’