Minnesota is experiencing a noticeable, borderline seismic shift in its demographics, and there are now more than one million adults ages 60 and older.
The great news there is that we’re living longer and generally healthier lives. And with those extra years comes a chance to reframe our concept of aging — specifically what it means to be retired and how lifelong learning can enhance the passions and contributions of older adults.
Those issues frame the work of Rajean Moone, associate director of policy in the Center for Healthy Aging and Innovation (CHAI), housed in the University of Minnesota’s School of Public Health.
About six years ago, Moone and CHAI launched the Age-Friendly University (AFU) initiative on campus. AFU is a global movement that started in Ireland, is now housed at Arizona State University and has grown to more than 120 universities worldwide. The Twin Cities campus became the first university in the state to receive the designation, and four others — including the University of Minnesota Duluth — have since joined.
“The purpose is for us to engage lifelong learners, older adults, and retirees in campus life because we believe that it enriches learning,” Moone says. “We believe that intergenerational exchanges are really our present and our future, and [being an] Age-Friendly University provides a really nice framework to help us understand what are our opportunities and some of the challenges we may be experiencing on campus.”
When Moone first put the call out across the Twin Cities campus asking who would be interested in pursuing the AFU initiative, he was thrilled by the response. There are now more than a dozen members of the Age-Friendly University Council, from CHAI and the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute to the University of Minnesota Alumni Association and the Bakken Center for Spirituality & Healing to the Women’s Club and the University of Minnesota Retirees Association, representing 900 members.
“The University of Minnesota Twin Cities campus is huge, and the Age-Friendly University initiative brings together all of these different pieces and kind of weaves that quilt of lifelong learning,” Moone says. “And to be able to engage the Retirees Association and the Women’s Club — people who want to give back to campus — it’s just been amazing, the synergy and energy around the council.”
Intergenerational learning and the University of Minnesota’s land-grant mission
For Moone, who wears his passion for his work on his sleeve, becoming an Age-Friendly University was exactly the right step taken at the perfect time.
“We can seize this opportunity, particularly as a land-grant university, to ensure that our community mirrors the community around us,” he says. “And the community around us is intergenerational, it’s growing more diverse, and it’s growing older. We need to embrace that.”
Indeed, the University of Minnesota’s new strategic roadmap, Elevate Extraordinary 2030, specifically points to the changing demographics of higher education, the need to be lifelong learners, and the imperative to meet learners wherever they are, both geographically and in life stage. The University plans to help meet the needs of lifelong learners with flexibility and personalized learning by building a comprehensive online learning hub in the coming years.
One of the 10 principles of an Age-Friendly University is encouraging older adults to participate in all the core activities of the university, including educational and research programs. Another is “to promote intergenerational learning in order to facilitate the reciprocal sharing of expertise between learners of all ages.
“Intergenerational exchanges enrich our campus,” adds Moone. “Not just bringing older people on campus to benefit them, but to actually benefit our students, our faculty and our staff. We believe that it’s vital to have an intergenerational campus, and the premise of age-friendly universities is age inclusivity.”
Below: Attendees browse the many information tables between sessions at Age-Friendly University Day in 2025.
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