Bright Spots in Supporting Student Parents at Institutions of Higher Learning: University of California, Los Angeles
This is the second blog in a three part blog series that spotlights bright spots among Institutions of Higher Education (IHEs) that have worked to address the needs and challenges of student parents of infants and toddlers through innovative initiatives, as featured in our new policy brief, Supporting Student Parents and their Young Children in California’s Institutions of Higher Education.
Since 2009, the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) has had the Students With Dependents (SwD) program, which offers support to undergraduate, graduate, and professional students who identify as parents, guardians, or caregivers. With a dedicated staff consisting of a director, a grant manager, and a coordinator, the SwD program directs students to resources tailored to support their families throughout their academic journey.
When a student parent engages with the SwD program, they gain access to subsidized child care, essential supplies like diapers and formula, access to priority enrollment, connection to peer support groups, and more. In addition to the priority enrollment process, the SwD staff also helps parents in applying to CalWORKS, employment services, family housing opportunities, and financial assistance. The SwD program works with the admissions office to find student parents but relies heavily on outreach and word of mouth connections of the program and its offerings.
There is also a task force under SwD composed of students, faculty, staff, and university leaders who meet to cultivate a more family-serving campus by sharing information, reviewing current institutional policies and processes in place, gathering data, and advocating for equitable environments. For campus community support, UCLA has the student organization Bruin Parent Scholars, which promotes campus engagement and advocacy opportunities for student parents.
Ishia Orozco-Barajas is the Director of the SwD program at UCLA. With experience as a prior student parent, she believes equitable and accessible environments at institutions of higher education lead toward intergenerational growth within family units. She shares:
“By providing access to resources such as the CCAMPIS grant, parenting students’ financial needs are met for their child care needs, a lowing them to focus on their educational goals. Having relationships with early care and education sites, both on and off campus, creates opportunities of collaboration to bring awareness and access to state subsidy options available to families. Our goal is to reduce the stressors of navigating the plethora of resources available, which can often become overwhelming and add to the time poverty experienced by parenting students.”
Although SwD may feel like a drop-in program when contact is first made, SwD takes a case management approach in how it connects with student parents and meets their needs on a quarterly basis. Many of the services are made possible through funding from CCAMPIS, which is awarded on a four year basis and expires for UCLA in September 2025. UCLA offers three nationally accredited on-campus child care sites for students, as we l as three off-campus partnerships that accept CCAMPIS and it provides information on additional child care options like Crystal Stairs, Inc..