Most Inspirational Second Act: Grad Student Allyson Reneau

Allyson Reneau

Bio: A middle-aged mother of 11 from Oklahoma City who is commuting 2,000 miles each way to attend Harvard University

Attitude: "I seize the day," Reneau says on the Today show.

For the growing number of middle-aged Americans returning to college to pursue degrees, Reneau is perhaps the ultimate hero and role model. This fall, at age 50, the Oklahoma City resident -- a married mother of 11 -- began to fulfill her dream of earning a master's degree in international relations from Harvard. Each Monday, Reneau gets on a plane and travels 2,000 miles to Cambridge, Mass., for classes, and then catches another flight and returns home by Tuesday morning. An unnamed private benefactor has agreed to pay for her commuting expenses and tuition. She first began college at Oklahoma University in 1979, but then left after her sophomore year to marry husband Dale and begin a family. Reneau always intended to go back to school someday, but ended up spending nearly 30 years as a stay-at-home mom and as the operator of a gymnastics school that she founded. "Sometimes those dreams, you bury them," she tells the Associated Press. "You get so busy raising your family that you forget your identity."

Finally, in 2009, when the youngest of her 11 children was five, she made an appointment with an admissions advisor at OU. Initially, Reneau was a bit unnerved by the startling changes on campus since her initial time there, such as the switch from pen and paper to computers in the classroom. The gap in age between Reneau and her classmates also was glaring -- on occasion, teachers recognized her as the mother of one of their former students, her daughter. And after her classes during the day, she had to head straight to her gymnastics school to work, and then go home to prepare dinner for her family. Often, that meant waiting until 8 or 9 p.m. to get back to her required reading, assignments and studying for exams, which often kept her up late into the night. Reneau not only coped, but thrived, and managed to achieve a perfect 4.0 grade-point average at OU as a communications major before heading to Harvard this year. "I've got one life to live," Reneau tells the AP. "I'm going to live it and give it all I've got."

Honorable Mention: Joseph Roscoe, carpenter-turned-cancer researcher
Diagnosed with a stage IV Hodgkin's disease at 36, with a less than 50-50 chance of survival, Roscoe never doubted that that he would somehow find a way to survive, and he did. His experience prompted him to wonder if there was a connection between cancer patients' expectations and the outcomes of their cases, and he decided to try to find out. As his health improved, Roscoe began taking college courses at night. Eleven years after his diagnosis, he received a Ph.D. in social psychology from the University of Rochester. Since then, the 58-year-old Roscoe has worked on research projects for the American Cancer Society, the National Cancer Institute and the U.S. Army, among other organizations. As his wife, Laura, told Second Act, "I almost think the best thing that can happen to someone is to really think you're going to die -- and then live."

Honorable Mention: Bea Johnson, artist-entrepreneur-sustainable lifestyle pioneer
Johnson, who lives with her husband and two sons in Mill Valley, Calif., is eager to show us all that it's possible to live well with a minimal impact on the planet. As this SecondAct article details, the 36-year-old artist and her family strive for a zero-waste lifestyle built around the concept of using as little as possible -- "refuse" is her key word -- and reusing and recycling the rest. Part of that is turning down freebies of all sorts, carrying her own bags and cartons when shopping to eliminate packaging, and not letting any food go to waste. As a result, over a six-month period, Johnson and her family's total trash output fit inside a wineglass.

Honorable Mention: Cindy Joseph, fashion model
Chances are, you've seen Joseph's elegant cheekbones and resplendent silver tresses in ads for Ann Taylor and J. Crew, striking a subtle blow against aesthetic ageism. As this Second Act profile of the 60-year-old Joseph details, she quietly worked for a quarter-century in the fashion business as a makeup artist for supermodels such as Naomi Campbell and Cindy Crawford until one day she stopped dyeing her hair and allowed it to revert to its natural color. Before long, a casting agent approached her about becoming a model herself, and the rest was fashion history.

Keep reading: The Best Second Acts Awards 2011 
Day 1: Best Second Act in Sports 2011: Swimmer Diana Nyad
Day 2: Best Celebrity Second Act 2011: Jon Bon Jovi's Soul Kitchen
Day 3: Best Creative Second Act 2011: Poet Kay Ryan
Day 4: Best Second Act Comeback 2011: Entrepreneur Brad Gruno
Day 5: Most Inspirational Second Act 2011: Grad Student Allyson Reneau
Day 6: Best Second Act Making A Difference 2011: Judith Broder
Day 7: Best Second Act Reinvention 2011: E-book Author John Locke
Day 8: Best Second Act Game-Changer 2011: Room to Read's John Wood