By Glenna Murdock, RN, contributor
Judith Mathews, RN, Ph.D., dean of the Harold B. and Dorothy A. Snyder Schools in Plainfield, New Jersey, knows firsthand the difficulties of managing work and school as a single parent. Mathews’ personal experience gave her a clear vision of what was needed to help single parents achieve success as nursing students. Funds to institute her ambitious idea for a cost-free residential program, however, were a long time coming.
“It is tough for all students to learn in today’s world when there are family crises of one sort or another presenting themselves,” Mathews explained. “It is especially difficult for single parents who are raising their children alone while trying to support them by working at low-paying jobs and trying to keep up with their studies, too. But, I know that no matter where a person is in life, if given sufficient mentoring and support, that person can be successful.”
Five years ago Mathews crossed paths with a wealthy benefactor who shared her concern for single parents struggling to improve their lives. The late Audrey Snyder wanted to contribute a large amount of money to a project of significant enough size to be recognizable and that would honor her parents.
“At our interview, Audrey Snyder asked many tough questions,” Mathews said. “She, of course, wanted her money to be used wisely and for purposes she felt were important. She finally asked what my dream for the money would be and I told her that I’d like a brand new school that would include a residential program to assist single parents.”
Their mutual interest in the plight of single parents was a key factor in Snyder’s decision to contribute $8 million toward turning Mathews’s dream into brick and mortar.
The new building, bearing the names of Snyder’s parents, opened its doors in 2007, which marked the advent of the residential Audrey Snyder Single Parent Program.
The tuition-free program is small, accommodating just five students at a time. The students, each with one school-age child, comprise the single-family community that shares a housing pod on the top floor of the new Snyder School building. They share kitchen, dining and living areas but each family unit has a private two-bedroom suite. There is no charge for housing.
Mathews advertised and visited high schools to promote interest in the groundbreaking program but there was not the flood of applicants that one might expect.
“There is often hesitancy and mistrust within lower income populations,” Mathews explained. “It was difficult for them to believe that there wouldn’t be a catch associated with free tuition and free housing.”
Mathews handpicked the first five students from the Plainfield community based largely on their academic profiles.
“After their selection I took the five students, who had never met, to dinner and there was an instant bonding,” Mathews said. “It was amazing. They really are a large, happy family. They cook for one another, they study together, they care for each other’s children, they carpool the children to and from school. Everything that is characteristic of a family, they are. In the two years of the program there has not been a single problem”
Mathews recently asked the five children in the group to express in writing their feelings about their living situation. One young girl said, “I love my friends here. I feel safe here and when I’m away, I can’t wait to come home.”
The cohesiveness of the group might have been strengthened by Mathews’s cautionary words.
“I’ve emphasized that this is the sort of opportunity that will happen just once in their lives,” she said. “They take this privilege seriously and they try hard.”
The Snyder School’s nursing, medical imaging and therapeutic sciences programs are under the sponsorship of JFK Medical Center in Plainfield and operate in conjunction with Union County College. The residential single-parent program is open to students of both genders. The first graduate from the program is a single father of a now-11-year-old daughter, originally from the Blood Diamond area of the Congo who sought asylum in the U.S.
“He says the U.S. is a step to heaven,” Mathews recalled, “and he feels so grateful for this program. He plans to focus on international pediatric health care.”
Mathews wants all of her school’s students to be successful but knows that personal struggles often get in the way. The nursing program at the Snyder School can be completed in two and a half years, yet the average completion time is four years.
“I tell those who are overwhelmed,” she said, “that this might not be the time to meet their goal, but that time will come—there’s always a way. If students are allowed flexibility and given resources, a caring faculty, mentoring and an environment in which to learn, they can achieve whatever they want.”
© 2009. AMN Healthcare, Inc. All Rights Reserved.