I wanted to share my response to a misinformed column that was published in The Daily last week, "Child care is not the UW’s responsibility" (May 19, 2011).
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By Ben Henry
Many years ago, an ambitious and talented college student was pursuing his dream of becoming a journalist. He had experience as a sports broadcaster and a knack for the gab, and many believed he had a bright future ahead of him.
But he would never get a shot at realizing his lifelong ambition. Alas, fatherhood beckoned, and he did what made the most sense to him at the time, dropping out of school to provide for his family.
That man, my father, went on to become a cab driver — an honorable profession, but not exactly the stuff dreams are made of. We led a difficult life, scrambling, on a seemingly month-to-month basis, to make rent.
For my father, his dream died with the birth of his son. But it didn’t have to be that way.
As a parent and public policy student at the University of Washington, I have had the opportunity to experience first-hand what UW does well and not so well for students with children. Like my father, I, too, have faced difficult choices. I am finishing a master’s degree while trying to raise my 2-year-old son, Jack, in a time when tuition and cost of living are exponentially greater than when parenthood unceremoniously claimed my father as a college dropout.
The Graduate & Professional Student Senate (GPSS), which has advocated for student-parents for many years, has been a leader in determining the unmet needs and telling the stories of this underserved population, through our Students With Children Awareness Day on May 9 and the Students With Children Census.
Through our efforts, we have found student-parents who are strung-out, desperate and barely surviving. We have encountered students who are walking an incredibly tight line between being able to pursue their dreams and having to drop out. These are students who are a baby’s sneeze away from having to miss an important exam, and must face the cold, hard reality that they aren’t spending the kind of time with their children that they so greatly desire.
It is for these parents that we are saddened by the shockingly uninformed rantings of columnist Peter Sessum ("Child care is not the UW’s responsibility," May 19). Mr. Sessum claims that “there is no secret part of being a student with a child that the rest of the campus needs to recognize.” Clearly, the despair that student-parents face are a secret to him, which is precisely why awareness needs to be generated.
Don’t just take my word for it.
"Most days when I am alone, I am crying from the stress,” says one undergraduate Business Administration student. “I consider quitting every few days. I have tons of guilt for not spending enough time with my kids, and for always being cranky and tired from studying all night. I feel like I am swimming upstream without an arm or leg."
One graduate Public Affairs student says she feels she is failing as a student and a mother.
“These feelings are cemented when advisors ask me how I feel about ‘underperforming in grad school,’” she said. “These feelings are cemented when I have to choose between going to class and nursing my sick infant. These feelings are cemented when I struggle to find the time to write my degree project when my son is buzzing around me in all his 2-year-old fury. The past two years have been a constant struggle, a constant feeling of failure, and the recurring relief of finding out I have just barely passed quantitative analysis or some other class.”
For most, parenthood significantly delays their graduation and impacts their academic performance. A preliminary analysis of the GPSS-sponsored census finds that 71 percent of all survey participants say parenthood will delay their graduation. Meanwhile, 63 percent say parenthood has a “moderate” or “significant” impact on their academic performance.
Readers who are not parents may ask, Why should I care? Why is it important for the greater University community to be aware of the challenges students with children face?
The fact is, parents on this campus have been marginalized and made to feel like they have committed some kind of crime just for having a child. This manifests when some professors are unsympathetic when a student must stay home because their child is sick. Or when students are called "bad parents" by people like Mr. Sessum for having the courage, for one simple day, to come to campus with their little ones in tow to proudly declare to the university community that, yes, I am a mother, I am a father, and I am not ashamed to say it.
A lack of affordable childcare is the third greatest barrier to degree completion, and mitigating those barriers increases the likelihood that parents — and their children — become productive members of society.
Is it not in taxpayers' interests to give low-income parents who aspire to earn a degree a path to their dreams, providing them with an option beyond social services? Give a parent a fish, and they will feed their child for a day. Teach a parent to fish, and they will not only eat for a lifetime, but they will teach their children, as well.
Student-parents are not asking for a hand-out. We are merely asking that it be just a little bit easier to acquire some fishing line.
***
By Ben Henry
Many years ago, an ambitious and talented college student was pursuing his dream of becoming a journalist. He had experience as a sports broadcaster and a knack for the gab, and many believed he had a bright future ahead of him.
But he would never get a shot at realizing his lifelong ambition. Alas, fatherhood beckoned, and he did what made the most sense to him at the time, dropping out of school to provide for his family.
That man, my father, went on to become a cab driver — an honorable profession, but not exactly the stuff dreams are made of. We led a difficult life, scrambling, on a seemingly month-to-month basis, to make rent.
For my father, his dream died with the birth of his son. But it didn’t have to be that way.
As a parent and public policy student at the University of Washington, I have had the opportunity to experience first-hand what UW does well and not so well for students with children. Like my father, I, too, have faced difficult choices. I am finishing a master’s degree while trying to raise my 2-year-old son, Jack, in a time when tuition and cost of living are exponentially greater than when parenthood unceremoniously claimed my father as a college dropout.
The Graduate & Professional Student Senate (GPSS), which has advocated for student-parents for many years, has been a leader in determining the unmet needs and telling the stories of this underserved population, through our Students With Children Awareness Day on May 9 and the Students With Children Census.
Through our efforts, we have found student-parents who are strung-out, desperate and barely surviving. We have encountered students who are walking an incredibly tight line between being able to pursue their dreams and having to drop out. These are students who are a baby’s sneeze away from having to miss an important exam, and must face the cold, hard reality that they aren’t spending the kind of time with their children that they so greatly desire.
It is for these parents that we are saddened by the shockingly uninformed rantings of columnist Peter Sessum ("Child care is not the UW’s responsibility," May 19). Mr. Sessum claims that “there is no secret part of being a student with a child that the rest of the campus needs to recognize.” Clearly, the despair that student-parents face are a secret to him, which is precisely why awareness needs to be generated.
Don’t just take my word for it.
"Most days when I am alone, I am crying from the stress,” says one undergraduate Business Administration student. “I consider quitting every few days. I have tons of guilt for not spending enough time with my kids, and for always being cranky and tired from studying all night. I feel like I am swimming upstream without an arm or leg."
One graduate Public Affairs student says she feels she is failing as a student and a mother.
“These feelings are cemented when advisors ask me how I feel about ‘underperforming in grad school,’” she said. “These feelings are cemented when I have to choose between going to class and nursing my sick infant. These feelings are cemented when I struggle to find the time to write my degree project when my son is buzzing around me in all his 2-year-old fury. The past two years have been a constant struggle, a constant feeling of failure, and the recurring relief of finding out I have just barely passed quantitative analysis or some other class.”
For most, parenthood significantly delays their graduation and impacts their academic performance. A preliminary analysis of the GPSS-sponsored census finds that 71 percent of all survey participants say parenthood will delay their graduation. Meanwhile, 63 percent say parenthood has a “moderate” or “significant” impact on their academic performance.
Readers who are not parents may ask, Why should I care? Why is it important for the greater University community to be aware of the challenges students with children face?
The fact is, parents on this campus have been marginalized and made to feel like they have committed some kind of crime just for having a child. This manifests when some professors are unsympathetic when a student must stay home because their child is sick. Or when students are called "bad parents" by people like Mr. Sessum for having the courage, for one simple day, to come to campus with their little ones in tow to proudly declare to the university community that, yes, I am a mother, I am a father, and I am not ashamed to say it.
A lack of affordable childcare is the third greatest barrier to degree completion, and mitigating those barriers increases the likelihood that parents — and their children — become productive members of society.
Is it not in taxpayers' interests to give low-income parents who aspire to earn a degree a path to their dreams, providing them with an option beyond social services? Give a parent a fish, and they will feed their child for a day. Teach a parent to fish, and they will not only eat for a lifetime, but they will teach their children, as well.
Student-parents are not asking for a hand-out. We are merely asking that it be just a little bit easier to acquire some fishing line.
Well said! Thanks for this.
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