As president of Los Angeles Valley College, I am always inspired by the commitment and many skills our student parents bring to our campus. Melissa Almaraz is a mother of two children who works part-time while studying nursing. While her 16-year college journey has been interrupted at times, she is determined to fulfill her goals. She has dreams of completing her degree so her family can achieve economic security – something she never had as a child. Melissa and her sisters often relied on her aunt to bring home leftover meals from her job as a Los Angeles Unified School District cafeteria worker. Melissa, like so many student parents, wants more for her children.
Across Los Angeles County, more than 68,000 college students are caring for a dependent child, many of whom are women of color and living at or below the federal poverty level. By achieving their educational goals, parents create opportunity, change their families’ economic trajectories, and transform their communities. Research shows that parents can double their incomes by completing their college degrees. However, student parents face barriers that make it harder for them to graduate. In Melissa’s words, “Children should not be a barrier to higher education. They should be a prong on the ladder that gives us more momentum to continue to move forward.” By using a two-generation (2Gen) approach that recognizes parent and child outcomes are inextricably linked, colleges can create environments that allow student parents and their children to thrive, building educational equity and economic mobility for generations.
While California is a leader in mandated support for student parents, too many students lack awareness of available resources. At Los Angeles Valley College, we meet this challenge by providing wrap-around support to help student parents succeed in college. LAVC is home to the Family Resource Center – a physical one-stop shop open to students caring for children. The Center offers everything from emergency stipend opportunities to parent workshops. And while LAVC has long been recognized as a pioneer among student parent advocates, we know that far too few student parents are taking advantage of the college’s support. In fact, Melissa only learned about the Center by stumbling upon it during an internet search. Since then, she has made use of the Center’s baby supplies, printing services and child-friendly environment.
Data shows that the Center is an effective solution to help student parents achieve academic success. The Institute for Women’s Policy Research completed a study of LAVC student parents in the spring of 2022 and found that the Center is doubling the likelihood of successfully attaining a degree or certificate for student parents. And yet, a majority of LAVC’s parenting students are not using college programs specifically designed for them, according to a May 2024 survey performed by the college.
Between the California Work Opportunities and Responsibility to Kids (CalWORKs), Cooperative Agencies Resources for Education (CARE), the Child Development Center, and the Family Resource Center, the program offerings available to student parents at LAVC are robust but admittedly complex. We cannot place the burden on student parents like Melissa to track down supports that are not easily accessible. They are arguably our busiest population of students, spending many hours each day caring for their families and working to provide for them. Time poverty poses a significant barrier to their academic success. With this in mind, our leadership team at LAVC decided we must take action.
A key step forward involves our two-year partnership with Ascend at the Aspen Institute. As one of four community colleges selected for Ascend’s Postsecondary Leadership Circle Activation Fund, Valley College has received funding and technical assistance to identify barriers to student parent services and make changes to increase the number of students who receive support. Our recent survey has revealed that student parents are unaware of support available to them and their rights under state and federal law.
Recommendations include designating a program that will lead to coordination of our efforts to support student parents, mapping family-friendly campus spaces and programs, and developing an awareness campaign to ensure students, staff, and faculty are aware of available resources and student parent rights.
Our team at LAVC will focus on implementing these recommendations on our campus, and we are eager to work as an institution, as a college district, and as a county to support parenting students across Los Angeles. When we invest in our student parents, we are building a better future for us all.
Barry Gribbons, Ph.D. is president of Los Angeles Valley College where he has served since 2019. Los Angeles Valley College is one of the largest of the nine campuses of the Los Angeles Community College District with more than 18,000 students in the eastern portion of the San Fernando Valley.
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