This article summarises the background to the development of further education and goes on to describe research carried out with a group of older mature students in a further education college in Ireland. The first research element was a survey and focus group, followed by interviews, which explored with the students their reasons for returning to education, their experience while in further education and what they consider to be the benefits of participation. Three significant concepts emerged from the analysis. The first concept, the latent self, describes a range of social, structural and biographical influences and how they interact and impact on the decision to return to education. The second concept, the emerging self, describes the negotiation of challenges faced by the students in the process of change. The third concept, the revised self, describes the changed self emphatically described by the students as resulting from their participation and characterised by greatly enhanced confidence and agency, which benefits the students, their families and society. Finally, I offer some reflections on the implications of the research for the development of the revised further education and training sector under the new Education and Training Boards and its relationship with other sectors of education in Ireland.