Alice ISD reiterates strict ban on toy weapons after senior prank concerns<\/a><\/p>\nThe effort stems from Texas House Bill 1361, which requires public colleges and universities to designate a liaison officer to assist parenting students.<\/p>\n
University leaders say the Islanders Caring for Parenting Students program is helping meet those needs by offering expanded resources, including assistance with testing and licensure fees, child care and transportation.<\/p>\n
Dakota Cloud, a sophomore nursing major, is among the students benefiting from the program. She is raising three children while working full time and attending school.<\/p>\n
\u201cEven though you are a parent, that doesn’t mean that you have to give up your dreams,\u201d Cloud said.<\/p>\n
Cloud said her journey into nursing was shaped by her son\u2019s health challenges. Her 11-year-old was diagnosed with Common variable immunodeficiency, a condition that makes it harder for the body to fight infections.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe started getting closer to a diagnosis for my son and I was missing, so I reached out, I got referred to Karyn, and we spoke and then it’s really been uphill from there,\u201d Cloud said.<\/p>\n
Her son began showing symptoms at just six months old, but it took years before doctors reached a diagnosis. That experience motivated Cloud to pursue a degree in nursing.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhenever my son got sick and no one could figure it out and I just felt like, I was already nursing at home without a degree pretty much for my own child,\u201d Cloud said. \u201cAnd advocating for someone else and their own children is just really something that I find dear to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Balancing school, a full-time job at a psychiatrist\u2019s office and raising three children is not easy, Cloud said, but access to campus resources has made a difference.<\/p>\n
Associate Dean of Students Dr. Claudia Ayala, who leads the program, said many parenting students face financial barriers beyond tuition.<\/p>\n
\u201cAffording child care can be a barrier for a student. The educational costs, you know, it costs not just for books and software that you might need for a class, but sometimes you need to have funds to test for licensure,\u201d Dr. Ayala said.<\/p>\n
The program is currently supporting about 250 student-parents, helping them stay enrolled and on track to graduate. Dr. Ayala said efforts are underway to secure additional funding to continue the program beyond the current grant.<\/p>\n
Cloud said she hopes other parents will be encouraged to pursue their goals.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are there as parents to show them that you can overcome anything you put your mind to, and if going back to school to get a degree is something that you’ve been thinking about, I think that you should really do it,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
University officials encourage parenting students to reach out and fill out the form on the program’s website<\/a> for support and take advantage of available resources.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A TAMU-CC program easing burdens and supporting parenting student is offering help with child care, licensure fees, transportation,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":248985,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[155,157,156],"class_list":["post-248984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-corpus-christi","tag-corpus-christi","tag-corpus-christi-headlines","tag-corpus-christi-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248984\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/248985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}