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This article analyzes the experience of trade union officers who entered university as part of a professional retraining program. Atypical students, with fewer qualifications and older than other students, they had difficulty accepting the rules imposed by their professors. They resisted the prevailing institutional norms. As a result, many of their relationships with their educators were marked by conflict. However, in this article, we demonstrate that these conflictual relationships were also a means of collective adaptation to the demands of university life. In particular, the conflicts enabled them to harness the skills and knowledge they acquired during their time at the trade union to succeed at university.