by Jane Henrici, Ph.D.

Adults with children can face complications if they want to pursue education or career development and, while community colleges often try to make things as convenient as possible for adults, college resources may not be enough. Partnerships between community colleges and other schools, local nonprofits, private businesses, and government agencies can make a difference. Many creative ways of pulling these partnerships together have been found in different parts of the United States. One of these, highlighted by IWPR’s Student Parent Success Initiative (SPSI) in a new fact sheet, is Carreras en Salud: Carreras is a program of the nonprofit organization Instituto del Progreso Latino in Chicago, in partnership with Chicago’s Association House, the National Council of La Raza (NCLR), and the city college of Wilbur Wright. This particular partnership helps low-income adults, most of them Latinas with children, successfully obtain education, training, and certification in health care fields. The affiliated organizations help student parents through different curricula and services: for example, parents taking bridge courses at Instituto del Progreso, such as English-as-a-Second-Language, receive child care. IWPR is also examining the need to improve work conditions and opportunities for in-home care workers who are immigrant women (please see our earlier blog post) and a program such as Carreras shows great promise for improving the quality of jobs in care work. Partnerships among community colleges that help student parents to complete education and career development pathways, whether in health care or other occupations, can help maximize existing resources through community coordination.

Jane Henrici, Ph.D., is a Study Director with the Institute for Women’s Policy Research.

To view more of IWPR’s research, visit IWPR.org