\u201cWe just know that we need to do better as a college to better proactively support them,\u201d said Adan Sanchez, City College\u2019s dean of student affairs.<\/p>\n
Sanchez estimates that about 20% of City College students are parents. The library has a family study room with kids\u2019 toys and books, but they want to do more.<\/p>\n
The college plans to use bond funding to build a new Welcome Center<\/a>. That center will include a dedicated space for parents. It will also house offices that manage support services for low-income students and single parents<\/a>, Sanchez said.<\/p>\n \u201cInstead of having to go from here to another building or two buildings over, either with a stroller or with little kids,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n That would help, Lugo said. She said access to those programs can give student parents the confidence to enroll.<\/p>\n Courtesy of Elizabeth Lugo<\/p>\n City College student Elizabeth Lugo stands with her children, 9-year-ld Aaliyah and 13-year-old Felipe, after receiving a scholarship award from Friends of Downtown San Diego.<\/p>\n \u201cSometimes they are afraid to start because they don’t know that there’s programs that will support them,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n City, Mesa and Miramar Colleges have child development centers on campus. Priority for their childcare services goes to student families, but Sanchez said there\u2019s a waitlist.<\/p>\n \u201cThat’s going to be one of the partners that we’ll be looking at to see if we can do a kind of drop in, drop out kind of situation, or if we need to build something within this space,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n One of the goals for FamilyU is to improve how colleges collect data on student parents. That data can help school leaders prove the need for financial support, Sanchez said.<\/p>\n \u201cHow do we not just bring these resources to our students, but how do we validate their existence through data so that we can push and advocate for ongoing funding?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Mesa College participated in FamilyU in 2023. At Mesa, The Stand<\/a> provides food, clothing and school supplies to students.<\/p>\n Johanna Aleman is the college\u2019s basic needs coordinator. She already knew many of the students they served were parents.<\/p>\n \u201cWe couldn’t just do surface level stuff,\u201d she said. \u201cWe had to start digging in deeper for things.\u201d<\/p>\n Things like campus policies and how they\u2019re enforced.<\/p>\n Campus policy says<\/a> children can\u2019t be left unattended. They\u2019re not allowed in classrooms, but otherwise, they\u2019re allowed in places like dining halls.<\/p>\n \u201cEven with that, like we had employees who were telling parents, \u2018You can’t have your kid here,\u2019\u201d Aleman said. \u201cBut the guideline is as long as the child, the minor child, is with a guardian or adult, they are allowed on campus.\u201d<\/p>\n Aleman and her team started reminding staff about the policy at the start of the school year. They\u2019re working to add changing tables to campus bathrooms and high chairs to dining halls.<\/p>\n They also created the Family Resource Center. It has kids toys, books, diapers and infant clothing. And there\u2019s room for parents to study.<\/p>\n Della McCullough has brought her daughter here throughout the last two years.<\/p>\n \u201cI would pick her up right out of school and we would come here and we would just sit here and I would need to do homework,\u201d she said. \u201cShe was able to occupy herself while I was occupying myself.\u201d<\/p>\n Mesa College student Della McCullough sits inside the Family Resource Center on Thursday, Aug. 27, 2026.<\/p>\n McCullough is a single mom. She\u2019s 32, and she felt disconnected from her younger classmates when she first got to Mesa. Events for student parents helped her find her community.<\/p>\n \u201cI love to share this fact all the time, that it’s actually 1 out of 5 students that are parents,\u201d she said. \u201cYou could be a parent and I just don’t know.\u201d<\/p>\n Student parents have higher grade-point averages<\/a> than their non-parenting peers. But they\u2019re less likely to graduate on time, according to Generation Hope, the organization that puts on FamilyU. About half of student parents<\/a> opt for part time schedules, compared to less than a quarter of non-parenting students.<\/p>\n McCullough thinks parents often consider dropping out or putting their education on hold.<\/p>\n \u201cI think we’re constantly thinking about if this is going to be the day that we’re just going to have to sacrifice what’s important to us for the benefit of the family,\u201d she said. \u201cBut I think, and I remind myself, that both can be done.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getting a college degree can take a lot of time and energy. Add kids to the mix, and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":461856,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[74,76,75],"class_list":["post-461855","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461855","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=461855"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461855\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/461856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=461855"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=461855"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=461855"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"City](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/1789237476_478_.jpeg\")
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