Summer R. Cunningham
THE NEW Graduate Student Orientation at my university seems to be quite a well-attended event. After sitting through a two-hour presentation in the student union’s filled-to-capacity, seven-hundred-seat theater, we have adjourned to one of the neighboring ballrooms, where several colleges, student services representatives, and community interest groups have set up informational booths. The Graduate School has provided lunch, and I can’t help but wonder if the free food is part of the draw for most of the students present. Admittedly, it is for me. I grab a veggie burger and a bottle of water and head over to a table where two women stand chatting over their meal.
“Mind if I join you?” I ask.
“Of course not,” says the woman to my right. “We were just discussing our programs. It turns out we’re both in the College of Education.”
“Oh, how nice to already know one of your colleagues before classes start,” I reply.
“What about you?” the woman on my left asks.
“I’m in the Department of Communication. I’m currently working on a couple of essays about maternity; one is about reproductive choice, and the other is about being a single mom and a graduate student. I hope to expand some of my research in this area while I’m here.”
“Wow, you’re a single mom?” the woman to my left asks rhetorically. “Good for you.”
“It’s nice to see a single mom actively pursuing an education,” says the woman on my right. “I swear, all I usually hear are excuses from single moms about how everything is impossible and it’s just too difficult to go to school.”
“Yeah, good for you for not letting it get in your way.”
“Yep, single moms,” I reply, “are inherently lazy. Can you believe we’re not all doctors already, what with the free educations they’re just throwing at us? Not only do we get to go to school at no cost, but the government has this new program where they pay for all your child care while you’re in class, they send you a private nanny to get up with your child in the middle of the night when she’s sick so you can get an uninterrupted eight hours of sleep, and they even pay someone to do all your homework for you so that you don’t miss out on quality bonding time with your child.”
OK, I don’t really make that last comment. At first, I just stare, dumbfounded and infuriated at these comments made by these women. I wonder if they might want children of their own someday. Or perhaps they, like so many other academic women, are putting off maternity until they finish their doctoral degrees and obtain tenure. Perhaps they are destined to join the two-thirds of tenured women in the humanities and social sciences who, ten years after obtaining a Ph.D., still do not have any children or the 43 percent of academic women who do not have children at all (Mason and Goulden 2002; Townsley and Broadfoot 2008). In the end, I simply replied, “That’s exactly why I want to do this kind of research.”
WELCOME TO THE STORY
As I reflect on my experiences as a single mom pursuing a higher education, I find myself contemplating the best way to frame this narrative. Motherhood, especially single motherhood, is difficult; obtaining a higher education, in particular a graduate degree, is challenging and sometimes alienating, and attempting the two simultaneously often seems impossible. But the endeavor shouldn’t actually be impossible. Many scholars have addressed the obstacles that (single) mothers face when completing a higher education (see, e.g., Van Stone, Nelson, and Niemann 1994; Silva 1996; Hofferth, Reid, and Mott 2001; Haleman 2004; Lynch 2008; Mottarella 2009). Those obstacles include prejudice, problematic departmental and institutional practices, financial precarity, time poverty, child care, scheduling dilemmas, conflicting responsibilities, and academic conventions that are not conducive to (single) mothering. Yet simply listing these challenges is not enough to illustrate the complexities that (single) mothers face in their pursuit of a higher education. Moreover, these studies and the accompanying list of obstacles do not illuminate the various ways in which other members of the academic community play a pivotal role in a student mother’s ability to complete her degrees. The purpose of sharing my story of obtaining a higher education as a single mom is to ask readers to consider the ways in which they are part of this story. If more single mothers are going to return to school and succeed, things will need to change. We will need to work together to change them.
BECOMING A SINGLE MOTHER AND A STUDENT
I found out I was pregnant three days before my eighteenth birthday, July 1998, the summer before I was to begin my freshman year in college. The decision to continue the pregnancy and keep the baby was not made lightly. As many women who have found themselves in similar situations know, maternal decisions are complex. I cannot begin to account for them all here, but I will foreground a particular set of considerations that was foundational to my decision-making process. I decided I could not ethically become a mother at this point in my life unless I was confident of two things: (1) I would not allow myself to fulfill the negative stereotypes associated with teenage single mothers, and (2) I would not allow my child’s overall well-being (economic, emotional, social, physical, psychological, and so forth) to be threatened because I was young, single, and unable to provide for him as easily as a parent who was a bit older, perhaps with a career or a steady income or a partner. After much contemplation and soul searching, I decided I could do it. I could transcend stereotypes. I could be a good mother to my child without forsaking my own future or my son’s. Indeed, our futures were now intertwined. In order to be a good mother, I would need to invest in my future, which meant attending college.
My freshman year of college was awkward to say the least. I tried to hide my growing belly under baggy T-shirts and pants, but after a while it became obvious. I was an adult, but I was still a teenager. My body with its protruding middle and swollen feet marked me as different from my freshman contemporaries, and I felt myself become the object of chastising stares. They say that pregnant woman have a glow about them; I wasn’t feeling it. I felt awkward and ashamed, trapped in a body that told my story for me whether I wanted it to be known or not. I mostly didn’t want it known. I didn’t talk openly about my situation unless I had to. The beginning of my second semester was unfortunately one of those times that I had to talk about it; I was scheduled to give birth to my son midsemester.
On the first day of classes, I spoke with each of my professors, assuring them that I would keep up with all my assignments and that I would miss only as many classes as was absolutely necessary. Most of my instructors were very understanding and even accommodating, but my English professor was not. He had a very strict attendance policy: absences—excused or not—resulted in a significant point deduction from one’s overall grade. I approached him after the first class, nervous but hopeful he might be able to make an exception considering that an absence was going to be unavoidable for me.
“No exceptions,” he said. This made me a little angry, but I respected the fact that he made everyone play by the same rules. I nevertheless felt that I had a compelling argument, and I continued to plead with him: “A low grade could possibly jeopardize my scholarship. I promise I will keep up with the work. I just want the opportunity to obtain a good grade in your class.” But he insisted, “No exceptions.”
He made his point and could have left it at that, but he didn’t. This English professor felt he had the right to tell me that there were other alternatives for “girls like me” and that it wasn’t appropriate for me to be physically present at school during my pregnancy. He was surprised that I didn’t have the foresight to “take some time off” to handle my “condition” or simply “drop out,” but he was appalled that I didn’t at least have the decency to pursue my curriculum via correspondence classes. Inside of me a voice screamed, “I have the right to be pregnant! I have the right to pursue an education without being penalized or discriminated against for my decision to have a child.” But my words, stifled and shamed, remained trapped in my body, undeliverable.
Research indicates that student mothers consider positive, supportive interaction with faculty members regarding their familial constraints to be critical in their academic success (Medved and Heisler 2002). Student parents interact with faculty members as a way of managing the school–life balance, seeking support or assistance in the form of deadline extensions or excused absences. Studies have found that faculty members often refuse such requests for accommodation, reasoning that it would not be fair to make exceptions for certain students over others. Some students report that they perceived their only alternatives in such situations were to fail assignments or tests or to drop the class (Medved and Heisler 2002). In my situation, I fell into the latter category. I ended up dropping the English class, resuming it later with a different instructor. I refused to allow my former professor’s personal ideology to impede my progress, and I continued to pursue my studies tenaciously, albeit slowly. Looking back now, it frustrates me that I believed dropping the class was my only option for success, and it frustrates me more that the professor felt perfectly justified in speaking to me that way.
SUCCESS AND STRUGGLE
It took me eight and a half years to complete my bachelor’s degree as a single mom, working full-time, taking classes any way I could, and sleeping infrequently. But I did it, graduating in spring 2006 in the top one percent of my class and with my college’s highest honors. Due to my successful undergraduate career, several of my professors encouraged me to apply to graduate school, and I did. Yet as a graduate student, I continue to face issues with respect to work–life balance, social support, financial obligation, and university policies in an academic culture that frequently does not seem conducive to (single) motherhood. I often question my decision to pursue this path. I wonder if it is really the best choice for my family (my son, our cat, and me). I question it not because I don’t enjoy school, but because the pursuit of a higher education has taken a toll on my family in ways that I couldn’t have possibly imagined. And at times, being a good mom seems at odds with being a good graduate student. Research indicates that motherhood and academia are not solely at odds in my life, but rather that the structural norms and conventions of academe make it a difficult place to succeed for any woman who has children (see “Heeding the Calls” 2008). The following incident provides just one glimpse of this conflict.
It’s 10:18 A.M., and I get a call from the school nurse at my son Benjamin’s school. He is in her office. Coughing, sick, tired. Probably just a cold, but he wants to come home. He told me this morning that he didn’t feel well. I sent him to school anyway. Not because I’m cruel, but because I thought maybe he would feel better after he started moving around. He had no fever and didn’t seem to be in a dire state of illness.
“If you feel worse by second or third period, call me, and I’ll come get you,” I said, crossing my fingers, hoping he wouldn’t call.
I have a lot to do today. I have a graduate class at 2:00 P.M. I still have to finish reading the three-hundred-page book that was assigned for this week and write a relevant intervention question. I’m trying to organize a panel for the Southern States Communication Association’s annual convention, and the deadline is tomorrow. I know none of this will get done if Benjamin is home sick. If I go home, this will be the second class I will have missed as a result of single-parent-related obligations; it’s only the third week of the semester. I imagine what my cohort and professor must think: “Oh, there she goes, pulling the single-mom card again.”
It’s not like that at all. I wish I could be in class. I wish that my son were well. I also wish that I could be home caring for him without feeling guilty about it. But I do feel guilty. Almost daily I find myself making decisions where I must choose between being a good student and being a good mom, usually to the detriment of one or the other role. My options at other times are even more constrained, the conflict between obligations irresolvable because the conditions are created within a system not intended for people with my particular circumstances. A recent conversation with a campus administrator illustrates this point.
(UN)SUPPORTING CHARACTERS
“I am glad you were able to stop by so that I could meet you, Summer,” begins the associate dean. “I wanted to congratulate you in person, and let you know that this fellowship is the most prestigious that our university offers. You should also know that this honor comes with much responsibility and high expectations.”
I nod, inviting him to continue.
“The Graduate School has a number of events geared toward improving the experience and success of our students. We expect that as a Presidential Fellow you will be in attendance at these events. Here is a list of the workshops we offered this past semester; we anticipate adding even more by the time you join us next fall.”
He hands me a list of nearly a dozen seminars, each of them from two to four hours long. Many are held on the weekend or in the evening. I wonder what to do about child care, and I wonder how often I will actually see my son. Like many student parents, I worry about the lack of affordable access to child care on campus, which is critical for mothers to successfully pursue an education with a family in tow (Haleman 2004). Studies indicate that many institutions unfortunately do not provide on-site child-care facilities, and if or when facilities exist on site, they are often not affordable for students or not available during evening or weekend hours, when some mothers are required to be in class (Medved and Heisler 2002; A. F. Pearson 2010; Vancour and Sherman 2010).
“We also expect our fellows,” the associate dean continues, “to actively engage in research, participate in disciplinary conferences, and eventually publish work in scholarly journals. We are endowing you with these funds with the expectation that you will represent us in the field.”
“Do you offer any additional funding in the form of research or travel grants?” I ask, mentally calculating the expense of buying not just my way but also my eleven-year-old son’s to all the conferences I’ll be expected to attend. I also contemplate the cost to my son’s educational experience when he misses time from school as I further my education.
The associate dean responds, “Well, I think the Graduate Student Association offers a little funding, and sometimes individual departments have funding for their students.”
The scarcity of funding for travel doesn’t surprise me, but I guess I was hoping that the expectation to travel and represent my school at various conferences might somehow come with the financial means to do so.
Finally, the associate dean concludes, “What do you think? We’d really like to see you undertake your doctoral studies here. Are you up for this challenge?”
“Of course I want to tell you that I am,” I respond, “but I cannot give you my decision today because this decision impacts more than just me.” I nod toward my son, who sits in the chair next to me. “Look,” I continue, “I want to participate in as many of the Graduate School’s activities as possible. I want to immerse myself in my research and share those discoveries at forums with other scholars in my field. However, if I sign that paper, it means that I am committing to doing the very best that I can in light of all my responsibilities, my commitments, and my situation. But I can’t guarantee that my ‘best’ will deliver the kind of performance you have in mind. How will that be viewed in the eyes of the Graduate School? Should I still sign on?”
“You’ve made it this far; I’m sure you’ve got what it takes to see this through.” He does not pause to consider that the Graduate School or he as the associate dean, for that matter, might need to offer different kinds of support for students with nontraditional needs. He does not acknowledge the ways in which my success might be contingent on the practices of others, but instead he leaves it all up to me.
WORKING TOWARD A HAPPY ENDING
After I accepted the position as a Presidential Fellow, my son and I moved across the country last August. Despite my apprehension about some of the graduate school’s expectations and the difficulty of moving away from our entire support network of friends and family to a place where we knew no one, I still felt this award promised the best chance of actually completing a doctoral degree while also supporting and raising a child on my own. I figured the accompanying stipend would be enough to provide for us financially while simultaneously alleviating my teaching duties, thus giving me more time with my son.
The first year of my Ph.D. program unfortunately didn’t go as smoothly as I had hoped. Due to lack of available child care, my son spent several nights each week sitting alone in my office for hours so that I could attend graduate classes that finished well after his regular bedtime. He also missed an unprecedented amount of school, most of which was related to my academic choices and obligations. Some of his missed school days were the result of traveling with me to conferences, and although he presented with me, I will not see any reimbursement for his travel costs because they do not qualify as legitimate expenses. In fact, the cost of providing for another person while attending college does not seem to factor in anywhere, including the federally regulated financial aid formulas that universities are required to use when estimating students’ cost of attendance. Finally, the prestigious and generous fellowship offered by my university did not provide enough financial support to cover all of our living expenses. By the end of my fall semester, I was a month behind on my rent, I had to borrow money from another graduate student for groceries, and my son attended the last couple weeks of the semester with a piece of duct tape holding together the sole of his shoe. As a consequence, after receiving special approval from the dean of the Graduate School, I resumed teaching as a means of bridging the gap between the fellowship and financial aid I was receiving and our actual cost of living. Although the teaching helped financially, it also meant I would be spending even less time with my son.
However, my son and I discovered an abundance of new opportunities and amazing experiences over the last year as a direct result of relocating for my doctoral program. One of the journeys we have recently embarked upon together is initiating a collaborative research project about graduate student single mothers and their children. When I say “collaborative,” I mean Benjamin is my coresearcher; he interviews the children, and I interview the moms. We are interested in investigating how other single-mother-headed families are impacted by a mother’s pursuit of a graduate education. What obstacles do they face? How do they negotiate them?
So far our research has led to two major realizations. First of all, it is extremely difficult to find participants. We chalk that up to the fact that it is extremely rare to find single mothers who are completing a graduate degree. Second, there are limits to our study because research alone will not produce change. Policy changes must also be pursued. In the interim, the possibility for change can happen in the space(s) between the individual and the institution, in day-to-day relational interactions and negotiations between different individuals at and within institutions. This change requires the awareness and participation of various members of academia, not just single mothers. It means that women entering universities as new graduate students who meet single mothers at campus events and professors with young pregnant women in their classes need to realize that ways in which they perpetuate, unconsciously or not, negative stereotypes about single mothers. It means that deans of graduate programs who bestow single mothers with fellowship awards need to listen when recipients speak of their unique constraints and to reevaluate the institution’s expectations accordingly. It means that members of the academic community need to realize that the way we do things presently often has a way of precluding the participation of nontraditional students such as single mothers. This unfinished story is in need of collaborative revision.
HOW HIGHER EDUCATION CAN BECOME ACCESSIBLE TO SINGLE MOTHERS
In a recent conversation about the challenges I have faced as a single mother pursuing a higher education, my friend said to me, “You are not the first, you are not alone.” It is true: I’m not the first single mom to pursue an advanced degree; there were women before me, and there are other single moms doing it right now. I know some of them. I am, however, the only single mother among the graduate students in my large department at a Research I university. In this sense, I am alone.
Yet I am also part of a local community of students and professors and part of a larger community of scholars. I contribute even though it is often difficult to do so in a system that wasn’t designed for “girls like me.” When I began pursuing my college education as a single mother, I wanted to prove that it can be done despite the stereotypes and cultural narratives that say otherwise and despite the very real material constraints that threaten success on an almost daily basis. However, there are many days when I honestly do not believe I will reach my goal—not because I’m not smart enough or because I lack the drive or desire, but because so many of the challenges and obstacles that single mothers face when pursuing a graduate degree reside in circumstances that we simply cannot change on our own.
This essay ends here, but I hope it is not the end of the story. I hope to finish my education. I hope to see more single mothers do the same thing. Won’t you join me in finishing this story?
