So, you hang around college taking classes, decide you're enjoying yourself and decide to stay a while. A long while. Twelve years to be exact. But instead of graduating you withdraw your paperwork so you can stay one more year to study abroad.
"I realized that if I went one more year, I could study abroad," Lechner said. "That's one thing I haven't done."
Lechner's extended academic career has made him a celebrity of sorts. His never-ending student life has been featured in newspapers and on network television shows, not to mention campus publications across the nation.
By this spring he had completed 234 college credits, or about 100 more than needed to graduate, and was taking seven more.
Now I knew guys who had drawn out there normal four years to six or seven, but nobody was even close to this guy's league. He even qualified for a special "slacker tax" where people who stay too long get to pay double tuition. Funny thing is, even with all that seniority, he's not particularly popular.
Michelle Eigenberger, an editor at The Royal Purple, said Lechner may have achieved celebrity status, but most students are tired of it.
"It's getting old," she said. "For the sanity of the rest of the campus, we want him to get out of here."
He's got enough credits to graduate with a liberal studies degree in education, communications, theater, health and women's studies. Boy, has this guy got a rude awakening coming when he actually gets out in the real world. I suspect that degree will get him a fabulous position.
At Burger King.
Hold on to your hat. While I was in school during the early 70′s there was a guy on campus who had already been there over 8 years when I arrived. I can’t be more specific because he wasn’t much interested in providing accurate information. His mother’s estate had been directed to provide complete support for him so long as he was in school full time.
When I graduated, he was still there and wasn’t going anywhere if he could help it. He might still be there for all I know. He fit the description of a professional student. It truly was his occupation, and he was good at it.
Geeze. That’s pathetic.