Supports for Students: A Collaborative Approach

Bilingual early educators face linguistic, academic, and bureaucratic barriers to enrolling in and persisting in a degree program.¹ Any program designed to meet the needs of this population must include a variety of wraparound supports to minimize these obstacles.

At UDC-CC, Alvarado and Hamilton worked on addressing the barriers to enrolling in and accessing the program that existed at the university. Hamilton noted that she has been pushing the university to pay more attention to the needs of students who were educated in other countries or those who speak English as a second language. “What are some of the documentation we need to prove that they have graduated from high school, graduated from college?” she said.² On top of that issue was the fact that no one in the admissions or financial aid office at UDC-CC spoke Spanish.

In collaboration with the Multicultural Spanish Speaking Providers Association, program leaders held multiple information sessions to share application and admission requirements, and workshops on applying for financial aid. Each applicant was also provided with one-on-one support to ensure that the application and supporting documents³ were in order. Alvarado said that she pre-submitted all 80 applications and met with the admissions staff to determine as early as possible which applicants were likely to be accepted. “We needed to know that before students paid the $35 application fee,” she said.⁴ This process resulted in a cohort of 30 students, a mix of center-based infant and toddler teachers and family child care providers.

Much of that early work relied on volunteers, and so to better support future students, the program hired a Spanish cohort liaison to serve as the point person for prospective candidates and students in the bilingual associate degree program. Maria Teresa Aspinwall, who speaks Spanish and has served as the bilingual cohort liaison since early 2019, described her role as multifaceted. She is the first point of contact for the program and offers individual guidance to each applicant on admission, financial aid, program expectations, and transition into the program. In addition, she teaches the first year seminar course and provides translation help — a critical need given that applications for the city’s scholarship programs are in English.

Another big part of her role is being highly accessible to students, all of whom work full-time and are often unable to make appointments during typical business operating hours. “It’s such a non-traditional role, I don’t have an office, I am on the road. I go to Briya or I go to Backus and have office hours,” said Aspinwall, “I am always accessible and that seems to have worked well with this population.”⁵

At Briya, many staff members had gone through the degree program at UDC prior to the establishment of the bilingual program and described the challenges they faced navigating the enrollment process and taking coursework in English. Lorena Gomez, now the early childhood coordinator at Briya, said, “when we went to UDC, we did it on our own. The support at UDC was very limited, because they didn't really understand that we were foreign students…and we needed help. It took me six months to complete all of the paperwork.”⁶ This level of difficulty was common among staff members who went through the program—many waited six months to a year for admission to be granted due to the challenges of getting their previous education validated and translated. Similarly, Silvia Arias, early childhood manager at Briya, described the challenges of getting admitted to UDC and having to translate her English textbook into Spanish in order to be able to access the content.

Given their experiences, Gomez and Arias were more than willing to offer their knowledge and guidance to their colleagues who were trying to enroll in the new bilingual associate degree program. Part of this work involved encouraging students to apply and strategizing about how to make the program work for them. Most of the individuals we interviewed emphasized that the program was a once in a lifetime opportunity. Gomez said, “some of them were not that comfortable,” saying things like, “I don’t know about my schedule, my family, my children.” She said, “I told them you need to talk to your family,” since “this is a big opportunity…and we will help you through and support you.”⁷

To help streamline the enrollment process for the new cohort of teachers, Christie McKay, executive director of Briya, enlisted Elizabeth Bowman and Beth Kushner, both of whom support Briya’s adult education program, along with the early childhood coordinators at each campus. An initial 26 staff members expressed interest in the program and 10 were able to matriculate into the first cohort that started in January 2019. Kushner, adult career transitions coordinator at Briya, led the charge, informing staff what information was needed from them and coordinating with early childhood coordinators at each site. The coordinators are in charge of supervising teachers, talking through staff member goals, and identifying challenges to enrollment.

The team at Briya worked with individual staff members to fill out their applications, scanning documents, sending transcripts for evaluation, answering emails, and helping to get their enrollment packets ready. This was high-touch and time-consuming work. Kushner described having to go to the post office to mail original diplomas to California for review and then hand delivering them to the admissions office at UDC. Briya paid for the translation of these documents, which can cost up to $300 per document. These efforts were not lost on the teachers, one of whom shared with Kushner that, without the support offered, she would not have been able to enroll in UDC.

The comprehensive nature of its educational services has allowed the school network to grow its own staff,⁸ as several early childhood teachers and instructional assistants came through the adult education program. Teachers compensation is also increased as they earn additional credentials. And now, Briya’s leaders are investing in helping these educators enroll and persist in the bilingual associate degree program at UDC-CC. “We have a passion for ensuring that everybody is able to continue their growth. It doesn't matter if you're a staff person or a student, everybody is on a path to growth. So it made a lot of sense to have this be part of our program, because we want to make sure that everybody has the ability to continue their education,” said McKay, executive director of Briya.⁹

Both UDC-CC and Briya quickly realized that they would need to either hire or assign full-time bilingual staff members to help each program candidate get through the admission and enrollment process. As Bowman acknowledged, the program would not have happened had it not been for joint investment in funding two full-time staff members to get it up and running. “You need the staff who will just…constantly [be] on the phone working with each individual person to figure out the system,” she said. “What do we need to navigate? How do we get through it? And then what lessons did we learn from that so that next time it’s not as individually based as the first time.”¹⁰ To be sure, not every early childhood educator has access to employers with the capacity and resources to devote to helping career advancement. University and community college systems likely have greater capacity to be flexible with hiring, seeking out bilingual staff members to help with admission, financial aid, and enrollment. “This program would not be as successful if you didn’t have someone pushing away the barriers for each student,” said Aspinwall.¹¹

The majority of students in the program have received scholarships to cover the cost of tuition through two city scholarship initiatives for early childhood educators.¹² The Higher Education Incentive Fund (HEI), with an annual appropriation of $850,000 in local funds, is offered by UDC-CC¹³ to help early childhood educators obtain additional learning credentials, such as an associate degree.¹⁴ And, the Birth-to-Three Act provides approximately $185,000 annually to UDC¹⁵ to help cover the costs of tuition, fees and books for early childhood educators in the infant and toddler program.¹⁶

One student’s perspective captured the sentiments of many: “Y también agradezco tanto porque también todo estos ellos nos ayudado monetariamente, por que creo que si no tuviera esa beca, yo no hacía poder hacer esto.” [I really appreciate that they are giving us financial support. If it wasn’t for the scholarship, I would not have been able to do this.]

Finally, the program uses a cohort model that allows students to matriculate together, which provides another layer of support. According to research by the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment, this type of model was integral to the degree attainment of graduates of a Los Angeles-based bachelor's degree completion program. Cohort members stayed connected after graduation, seeking out advice from one another on workplace challenges and best practices in the classroom.¹⁷ “The support of each other is huge. They work together all the time; they have similar life situations. They just get the support of each other. They have dinner together before they go over to class,” Beth Kushner, adult career transitions coordinator at Briya, told us.¹⁸

The program is aligned with research demonstrating that wraparound supports are essential for promoting student persistence and success.¹⁹ In addition to receiving a high level of support with the enrollment process, students also were able to take their courses at times and in locations that were easily accessible, cover the cost of tuition with scholarships, and learn with a cohort of peers. Those who were teachers at Briya received additional support, like seeing the costs of their transcript translation/evaluation covered and having guidance from alumnae of UDC. Looking forward, program leaders will continue providing students with tutoring and additional academic supports. They also recognize the need to provide assistance with transportation costs and child care.

These support efforts appear to be paying off, with the program seeing a high retention rate and growing enrollment. The first cohort, which began in January 2019, has a notably high retention rate of nearly 84 percent. Nationally, the average first-year retention rate of students at two-year public universities is around 49 percent.²⁰ And as of spring 2020, 93 students are enrolled in the program across multiple cohorts. The growth in enrollment is notable given that the majority of individuals are learning about the program through word-of-mouth from current students.

As one student shared about her experience in the program, “[Los] horarios han sido muy flexibles…los maestros que tenemos son gente muy preparadas…yo personalmente estoy creciendo mucho académicamente y también desarrollando y creciendo como maestra.” [The schedule has been very flexible…the professors are well prepared…and I, personally, am growing a lot academically and also developing and growing as a teacher.]²¹