By day Pat Stifter is a dentist with a busy, full-time practice in Palos Park. By night she is a visiting professor, teaching brain studies and nutrition at DePaul University's Oak Forest Campus.

Similarly, David Simpson, 53, of Homewood, is a business communications consultant who was a future and options trader and former teacher. He has taught courses on ethics, philosophy and literature at DePaul Oak Forest. JoAnn Gesiakowska, 60, is a full-time teacher at Reavis High School in Burbank. She spends one evening a week at DePaul Oak Forest teaching students who are, on average, double the age of her high school students.

Experts who work in the community and also teach are a mainstay at DePaul's School for New Learning (SNL), a leader in providing individualized degree programs for adult learners. "The visiting professors add experiential learning; they are experts in their fields and work in the areas in which they teach," said Betta LoSardo, head of SNL curriculum at DePaul Oak Forest.

"Teaching adult students is a way to balance my life," said Stifter, 43, who has extensively studied nutrition and the effect the brain has on the body. "It's a way to give back to the community, to keep my horizons expanded and it's personally rewarding."

Gesiakowska first taught at DePaul 18 years ago while working at a Chicago bank. When her job was eliminated, she went back to school and obtained her teaching certificate. Now, she teaches history and related courses at Reavis and DePaul.

"It's exciting to work with young people and to help them develop into adults," she said of her tenure at Reavis. "With adult learners, you're the facilitator and they're tremendously motivated."

Established in 1972, SNL was one of the first schools in the country devoted to adult learning. It gives busy adults the opportunities to use their work experiences in the classroom and learn from professionals working in the community.

"Being a professional myself, it's difficult to go to school and have someone tell you how the work world is if they haven't been in it," said Roxane Sanderson, a Tinley Park native, who has worked in health care marketing for 22 years and will finish her undergraduate degree in communications at DePaul next June.

Beyond teaching, professionals in the community often are advisors to SNL students. They serve along with faculty mentors on a student's learning committee advising on such things as setting goals, choosing course work and designing a degree.

Sanderson asked Simpson to be her professional advisor after he was recommended for the role. "He understands what I do in my job and what I need to be doing academically to get where I want to be in my career," said Sanderson.

Gesiakowska also serves as a professional mentor and often helps adult learners in their switch to new careers. SNL was recently named as one of six "Best Practice" institutions in North America by the Council for Adult and Experiential Learning and the American Productivity and Quality Center, headquartered in Houston. SNL was touted for its individualized education of non-traditional students.