Heather Stepro, a 38-year-old history major, is a senior. She has light brown hair that touches the top of her shoulders and she has a full-time job. Her son, 19-year-old English major Joseph [Giuseppe] Stepro, is a freshman. They are both students at the University of Tampa.
Stepro said going to school at the same time as her son and at the same university hasn’t been odd for her. “It’s not weird, but it’s different,” she said. “Having a son that’s [in] college for one and having some of the same circles overlap, not necessarily classes, but people in classes or experiences with classes.” She said they both do their own things on campus and their paths cross when they cross.
Giuseppe had a similar opinion about attending the university at the same time as his mom. He said some people might find that situation awkward, but not him. “That’s silly, like, I’m not embarrassed to be seen with my parents,” he said.
Stepro said the nice thing about going to school at the same time as her son is having someone to turn to for help. “Well he’s always been so smart that the ‘helping mom,’ as far as academics, is long gone. He is always well ahead all his peers in school and [was] doing math in grade school that I can’t do,” she said.
Giuseppe admitted to helping his mom with assignments she had a hard time doing. “Okay, kind of a humble brag, but she’s kind of said that [she’s not able to help me with my homework] since, like I’ve been in high school.” He said he thinks it’s because the workload is more rigorous now than it used to be. He doesn’t think it’s because he’s smarter than his mother, but that he has a different way of thinking. He’s been on his own when it comes to homework for quite some time, and he doesn’t mind helping her out.
“College algebra was pretty tough only because it had been years since I did college algebra,” Stepro said. Giuseppe helped her with that class too. Her classes overall haven’t been hard as far as difficulty both rather with time consumption. “The reading loads have made it hard,” she said.
Giuseppe said he’s proud his mom made the decision to go back to school. “It’s kind of a big deal, right?” he said. “Even though she doesn’t know what she’s going to do with her degree when she’s done, good for her for getting one after so long.”
Stepro said she’s glad she waited to go back to school. “When I graduated from high school in ‘92, I wasn’t ready for college, but my dad had other ideas,” she explained. “He decided if I didn’t go to college I would be wasting my life, so he forced me to go to USF. Being a 17-year-old being forced to do something, you don’t want to do it, so I skipped school, didn’t go, failed out the first semester. And my dad said ‘no way I’m going to pay. You had your one chance.’”
Dr. Spencer Segalla, assistant professor of history, said it’s clear that Stepro wants to be in the classroom. “[She] not only has capable skills, but [she] does the work and participates actively in class,” he said. He also said she is a great student and adds variety to the classroom atmosphere because she isn’t a traditional student fresh out of high school. He said there are times he makes references to life experiences as a parent, and younger students can’t relate to those experiences. “It’s nice to have some people in the room who have children, you know, at least they understand where I’m coming from,” Segalla said.
Stepro said she didn’t go back to school sooner because she didn’t have the time, and when she did, she didn’t have the money or vice versa. “You know, you get married and life happens, and Giuseppe was small and I didn’t want to leave him at home while I was at school,” she said. She didn’t think she would have done as well if she had tried to go back sooner because she didn’t have the time. She laughed and said it’s not like she has much more time now.
Stepro goes to class, goes to work and goes home. She doesn’t have a lot of time for campus events. “I don’t join the student activities because I feel like ‘I could be your mom’ when I sit next to all these kids. It makes me feel old.”
Giuseppe, however, isn’t the only other Stepro on campus. Her husband works here too. Even though her husband is employed on campus and some of her professors know him, it hasn’t impacted her learning experience. She said her instructors don’t treat her any differently if they know him.
Dr. VanSpanckeren said she noticed Giuseppe’s last name and that’s how she knew his father worked at UT. She said he is seems to be quite smart. “I can tell he likes to be challenged,” she said. She also said Giuseppe is writing about Ezra Pound for his final paper, and Pound can be a bit hard to grasp at times. “He doesn’t talk much in class, but when he does, he is very articulate,” she said.
Stepro also feels sympathy for Giuseppe because both of his parents are on campus with him.
“Sometimes I feel bad for him being here at UT because he’s always under somebody else’s shadow,” she said. She said most of the faculty and staff don’t know her, but they do know her husband and she thinks maybe sometimes Giuseppe could be compared to his dad because of that. “I think that’s part of the reason he stays away from the history classes,” she said. Stepro tries not to cross paths with him when she can.
Dr. Terry Parssinen, professor of history, said he has known Stepro for a long time and invited her son to his class’s field trip to the Dali Museum this semester. He said they are both a pleasure to have around. “Heather always reads the material and often leads the classroom discussion,” Parssinen said. “Her insight into the material is informed, not only by her intellect but also by her ‘real world’ experience, including that of being a mother to a very bright college student. I have known Giuseppe since he was a boy and have followed his development through school by staying in touch with both his mother and his father.”
Stepro said Giuseppe was going to take a history class, but it ended up being the same class she was enrolled in. She was going to drop the course so he could take it, but he decided to let her take it instead. “I’m not taking any sort of literature-based class with him [Giuseppe] whatsoever,” she said. “I don’t want to be compared to him.” Heather laughed as she lifted her hands, one going up above the other, as if to say her son’s capabilities in the classroom are above her own.
“I taught him to read early, so he was reading well before kindergarten,” Stepro said. “He’s always loved to read and I’ve always loved to read, so we’ve always done that together. He reads as a hobby, he reads for fun and some of the things he reads for fun are things that people struggle with in classes.” Stepro has a hard time understanding abstract ideas and subtext in literature, and Giuseppe has been a big help in that department. “He explains a lot of things in the literature readings I do because I don’t get some of the symbolism and it drives him crazy,” she said. “I say, ‘She’s writing about a tree.’ Why isn’t it just about a tree?” When Stepro reads it straightforward; she doesn’t look for the message between the lines.
Outside campus Stepro and Giuseppe get together on Sundays. They watch “The Walking Dead” together and can’t wait for the next season. “He got me started on it, because normally I’m like ‘Zombies? No, thank you.’ He sat me down and said ‘watch mom,’” Stepro said. She said that’s one thing they can agree to like without having to read into it too deeply.
22-year-old, Dec. 2012 history alumna, Sara Winter, said Stepro was fun to hang with. “She’s older than the rest of the undergrad students, but you would never know it because she’s really outgoing and has a very sarcastic sense of humor,” Winter said. She used to wait sometimes with Stepro outside her son’s class. She said Giuseppe seemed pretty smart from what Stepro told her and the few times she met him.
Despite all his mother’s bragging, Giuseppe said she is more tech-savvy than he is. “I know she uses a laptop in her classes, but I don’t. I hate typing,” he said. “I handwrite anything that I can.” He hates when professors give assignments that have to be completed online. “Just give me a piece of paper,” he said. He said growing up in the digital age has not given him an advantage over his mom.
Stepro said she is looking forward to graduation. She originally planned to graduate in May but decided to push it back until December. “I want to take more classes because I like going to school,” she said. She has no clue what she is going to do with her degree when she graduates, so staying an extra semester seems like a good idea. Stepro has thought about teaching, but beyond that she’s not sure where her interests lie. She said that’s another thing she and her son have in common (not knowing what to do once they graduate).
Stepro doesn’t think her graduation experience will be strange or different because her son will be there watching her. She said it’s going to be just as fulfilling as it would have been had she gone to college straight out of high school.