FRCC child care program helps single mother reach for master's degree

Danielle Holmes felt herself teetering toward emotional collapse while trying to attend classes at Front Range Community Colleg in Longmont and raise her special-needs teenage daughter.

“I was on decline,” said 39-year-old Holmes. “I was in a math tutoring session at Front Range and I just broke down and told myself ‘I can’t do this.' It was in the heat of the moment. But I just couldn’t deal with things anymore.”

Holmes said she got help after being referred to Nancy West, dean of admissions at the Front Range Boulder County campus. West broke Holmes’ life down into increments and prioritized her goals, giving her hope she could get her degree.

Holmes also got financial aid from Boulder County’s Family Self-Sufficiency Program and steadied herself so she could get her associate’s degree and care for her daughter.

“I was able to get stable housing with reduced rent,” said Holmes, who is now pursuing a master’s degree at the University of Colorado Denver. “Front Range and the help I got there was my salvation.I don’t know what would have happened to me without higher education. I would have been lost.”

Front Range’s mission is to help students who are older, often have families of their own but also want a shot at a well-rounded education, said Maegan Vallejo, coordinator of a new program at FRCC to deliver affordable child care to students.

“A lot of our students wouldn’t be able to attend schools successfully without this support,” Vallejo said. “I think what we do makes a huge difference in their lives.”

Child Care Access Means Parents in School, or CCAMPIS, was started at FRCC in 2018 and is funded through a federal grant. The program provides funding to help cover monthly child care costs for students who have children younger than 12.

CCAMPIS can cover up to 60% of child care costs, Vallejo said. “That will be a huge relief to single parents and those who are married but worry about child care and trying to finish school,” she said.

To receive funding, a child care provider must be state licensed, nationally accredited or in the process of seeking accreditation within the next three years. The provider also could be rated Level 3 or higher or seeking the rating from Colorado Shines, Vallejo said. The statewide Colorado Shines program rates the quality of Colorado’s early learning programs on a scale of 1 to 5.

To qualify, students must be attending FRCC on a part-or-full time basis and be eligible for Pell grants, based on financial need. Students also must be seeking a degree or certificate and have a grade point average of 2.0 or higher, Vallejo said.

Students will get special priority if they are enrolled in nine or more credits, are a military veteran and earn a GPA of 3.0 or higher.

There are now 39 students enrolled in CCAMPIS. COVID-19 is forcing the program to adjust for parents who now must take all their classes online, Vallejo said.

“We are crunching our numbers and understanding who needs this program and who can move off the waiting list,” she said. “We always have 10 to 15 who are always on the waiting list. There has never been a lack of students who want to apply.”

Holmes said she was abused as a child and grew up as a ward of the state in Virginia. She divorced her husband but entered into an abusive relationship with her boyfriend.

She eventually left her abuser and Virginia with the help of a scholarship program that helps survivors of intimate-partner abuse get a college degree.

Holmes said she was drawn to Colorado and Boulder County and enrolled at Front Range in 2016 and got custody of her daughter, who had been living in Virginia. But the everyday struggles nearly sunk her, she said.

“I needed some help, I needed it badly,” Holmes said.

Through West’s counsel and the Boulder County housing program, Holmes not only survived but thrived at FRCC. She found a voice in student government and she represented FRCC on Colorado’s State Student Advisory Council.

She got her associate’s degree and transferred to Metro State University in 2018. She became the student body president at Metro State and earned her political science degree in May.

Along the way, Holmes helped establish a Former Foster Care Youth Steering Committee for the state of Colorado. The committee helps former foster-care youth become successful adults.

At CU-Denver, she will study public administration. Holmes said she sometimes finds it hard to get her bearings on how far she has come.

“It’s crazy, absolutely crazy what happened to me,” Holmes said. “But I couldn’t have done it without higher education.”

Correction: Maegan Vallejo's name was misspelled in the original posting of this story.