Karla Montenegro Gonzalez: Hi everyone, my name is Karla Montenegro and today we have California Lutheran University joining us. They're going to tell us a little bit more about what they offer for our Dreamers once they transfer
from any of the community colleges that are in Ventura County, particularly Ventura, East Ventura, Oxnard, and Moorpark College.
Today we have Nazareth Bautista joining us. She works in the transfer and Outreach office. We also have Diana Hernandez who
works with Admission and Outreach, and is the point person for Dreamers. And then we also have a student joining us, whose name is Maria Botello and you all will get an opportunity to ask questions to her.
And so without further ado, I would like to have Nazareth take over the presentation and tell us about Dreamers at Cal Lu.
Nazareth Bautista: Great. Thank you, Karla.
So today I'm going to be
me and Diana are going to be
discussing, you know what, Cal Lu has to offer. And then we will also be discussing Dreamer resources and what it's like to be a Dreamer
on campus at Cal Lutheran. So initially, I'm going to start with a couple of facts about Cal Lu, couple resources we have for our students.
So in general, we have a little over 3,000 undergraduate students on campus.
Our average class size for the traditional program is 17 students and for our Bachelor's Degree for Professionalsprogram is about 10 students.
I'll go into details about the difference between those two programs later in the presentation. We have about 27% students
that are first generation college students. I myself am a first gen college student. Shout out to the rest of you who are first gen.
We also became a Hispanic serving institution in 2016. 53% of our students come from underrepresented backgrounds.
97% of our graduates are either employed or in grad school within nine months, and a vast majority of our students in the professionals program would recommend that program to prospective and incoming students as well.
So as I had mentioned, there are two different
routes that a transfer can technically choose at Cal Lutheran. The first is the traditional transfer program, which is, you know, the traditional daytime program, the classic college experience that everyone,
you know, look for whether with classes during the day, typical, you know, five classes a week maybe four,
you know, full time. So that's what the traditional transfer program is like. We have 41 majors and 41 minors available. Our most popular are Biology, Business, Communication, Exercise Science, and Psychology.
And so those are our most popular amongst those majors. The bachelors degree for professionals
is a different route that transfer students can apply to if they're interested and if they feel that best suits their needs.
So one of the biggest differences between the traditional daytime program is that the professionals program is an evening program. Right? So most classes start and
they need one night a week typically between 6:00 to 9:30 and they actually work on terms an 11 week term as opposed to a full semester.
And another unique thing about the program is that they only offer nine specific majors being Accounting, Business Management, Communication, Computer Information Systems, Computer Science,
Criminology and Criminal Justice, an interdisciplinary major, Organizational Leadership,
and Psychology, and again, those nine majors are specific and only available only those are the only ones that are offered through the professionals program. Again very different from the 41 majors in the traditional program as well.
Okay, so now that we've learned right what offers and programs we offer at Cal Lutheran.
I'm sure now you're interested in learning what kind of support, we can offer you as a student on campus. So we have faculty and academic advisors at Cal Lutheran.
These are the first two individuals that you're actually going to meet
once you start enrolling in classes as a transfer student. So you're going to meet with your academic counselor that's going to help you enroll and get the courses that you need, while your faculty advisor
will likely be someone within the major that you're interested in studying and help make sure that you're following the proper sequence of courses
to get you registered for those in a proper chronological order, especially for our Science students our STEM students a lot of those courses are sequential and so
we have our faculty advisors there to help students to make sure that they're on the right plan to graduate with other courses in their major.
And also our academic counselors, will assist with the enrollment process and any inquiries that come up throughout the year. So you'll have both ends from academic advisors and faculty perspective, helping you out throughout your academic experience at Cal Lu.
Next, another resource we have on campus is our student support services. This is part of the trio program. So I don't know if any of you are familiar with
Upward Bound, EOP, with we have SSS or Student Support Services and what this program offers or assist first gen students,
as well as income qualified students and students with disabilities. And what they do is they provide personalized services such as academic counseling, workshops, professional development, four year ed plans,
and also information about grad school, if that's something you're interested. And they're really all there to help you to be a successful graduate from Cal Lu, right. So they offer really great personalized services to our students.
Next we have our Disability Support Services office. At Moorpark College, I believe it's called Access. So it's a similar similar office of support
to students who any student with disabilities who might need accommodations. Some of the accommodations we offer at Cal Lu, include alternative test locations, assisting with note taking,
allowing audio recording, lecture recording, even housing accommodations as well. Those are just a few to name, but those are some. We have an office specific for students who
need any types of accommodations or would like further assistance, you know, throughout their experience that Cal Lu.
We also have a writing center and our math center. The Writing Center is a really great place to brainstorm any, you know, writing, writing materials and writing skills,
brainstorm some edits for your class papers, presentations, projects, even resumes and cover letters they'll help kind of go over, but really they're there to help you
know creative writing. And our math center's actually brand new state of the art space to work on mathematical concepts, problem solving.
It's a space that has multiple whiteboards. We have even whiteboard tables. So it's really interactive that you get to
you know, really put those concepts to practice. And we also have loaner laptops with mathematical software if needed. And really, they're there to help you, the individuals at the math center with homework, test prep, mathematical understanding, problem solving, and study skills.
And we also have our career counselors. The center the Career Center is a great resource for students that are interested in volunteer work , internships, part time work, full time work.
One of the greatest benefits about being a Cal Lu student is that even after you graduate, you're still able to access those resources through career counseling. So even if you're graduated years from
now let's say you want a career change you're able to come back to campus and meet with a career counselor, because those services are available to you
for your life basically, and they offer great workshops on resume, cover letter, bargaining for, you know, a pay raise,
or, you know, questions about transitioning to a new career, or even just starting out, like I said, with volunteer and internships, that's all available to you through a career counselors and our career center.
And we have all those resources or academic resources to help you go beyond the classroom, right. So our goal is really to kind of apply theory to practice.
So that you're able to apply what you learn in the classroom to your careers after you graduate Cal Lu.
Because we understand that, you know, you're not going to get Cal Lu forever, but we want to make sure that your best prepared
for life after Cal Lu and what that looks like. And so we offer a multitude of professional development opportunities, local and out of state locations. In fact, one of our most popular
out of state locations is the semester program at Washington DC. And what's really great about that program it's offered in the fall and the spring typically, and this is all pre-Covid, right,
we had to
You know, to change things up a bit with study abroad, but traditionally it's one of the most popular
out of state semester long internship and academic opportunities that we offer to our students.
That semester long at Washington DC, students are able to partake in an internship for those 14 weeks that they're there and take evening courses. So you're both doing academic work but also gaining hands on experience as well.
We have over 500 students participating in internships and
really that's
we have. Sorry, I got a message on the side. So, we have over 500 students participating in internships and one of the greatest things about Cal Lu is because we're so small
we have more of a collaborative versus competitive environment and so
what that means is that, you know, we have internship opportunities and it's not so much a competitive environment where everyone's kind of
clawing or scratching to get the last internship or the last research opportunity because we have a lot of connections and as it says, you know, we have access to thousands of important contacts.
Contacts for jobs and internships. So again, really an environment where it's more collaborative versus and competitive.
We have three different locations for Cal Lu. Our main campus obviously is in Thousand Oaks. And then we also have our Oxnard and Woodland Hills campus.
A lot of our professional the classes for Bachelor's Degree Professional program are offered between Oxnard, Woodland Hills, Thousand Oaks. However, for our traditional students most of our classes are offered on the main campus.
Parking is free for all students. We have a commuter friendly campus. A lot of our students, are commuters, and we have a good chunk that a residential as well.
But the other half are commuter and we have a lot of commuter friendly areas, especially on the main campus. There's a lot of different things that either students can
go to, and have you also have great dining facilities, I'll get to that in a minute. And then traditionally for the Bachelor's Degree for Professionals
we offer online classes. Of course, since we're in this now Covid world all of our classes are currently online. Additionally,
we have options for online courses for the Bachelor's Degree for Professionals and our typically our traditional transfer program or the day time program, excuse me, is all in person.
So speaking of those who live on campus, we have 15 coed
res halls and typically for transfer students, your housed with upperclassmen so even though you're considered a new student, you are not happy with the first year students straight out of high school.
You are placed with other upperclassmen typically within their sophomore, junior, or senior year.
As I had mentioned, we have our dining options. Our main the main one that students who live on campus have
you know, the dining plan with is through our Ullman Commons which is
you know, our common cafeteria, if you will. We also have The Habit and Starbucks, which is the largest one in Ventura County and it's a really nice spite of place spot to be and study for, and then we also have a Jamba Juice as well.
So just a couple of our dining options on campus. Oh, sorry about that. We have over 100 student led clubs and organizations. We have
hundreds of social events, including our athletic games. And again, this is all pre-Covid, but even now, we've actually have posted quite a few socially distanced
safe events on campus for students who are living on campus and kind of to get them to still somewhat interact, but at a social justice place. So our student life has been doing a great job in creating socially distanced events for our campus to still enjoy even now.
So as far as athletics. Here is a list of all of our athletic teams. This doesn't even touch our intramural teams. We have a
vast majority of intramural teams as well, but for anyone who's interested in sports, Cal Lu has that option. We are a division three school and
good population of our students are student athletes, so
our faculty members do a great job in working with our student athletes to make sure that they're able to continue participating in their athletic competition, but also have a good balance of between their academics, right. So
you know they're typically very understanding of when students have to potentially leave early of class to go to a game or to go to practice.
But also they work really well with our students to make sure that their academics, you know, don't fall behind and are consistently there to assist them if they have any questions.
Alright, so now I'm going to go into the bread and butter of our application requirements for
our transfer students. And as I had mentioned, we have our traditional transfer our traditional daytime program and our Bachelor Degree for Professionals. Both of these programs have different
applications and different admissions requirements, so it's really important to just know which one you're interested in and and take note of
what those requirements are for those specific programs. So, as a rule of thumb, we accept up to 70 transferable
credits from community colleges. I believe that's the same for almost all four year institutions.
But we accept a maximum of 70 units. Typically, students are coming in anywhere between 30 to 60 units, but on occasion we'll have some students who were pushing that 80 sometimes 90 unit range.
So we take a max of 70 credits from community colleges. If any of you are following an IGETC or CSU Breadth pathway
we accept those as well. Sometimes, students will ask if we accept UC transferable credits or CSU. We'll take both so we don't have a preference between the IGETC or CSU Breadth plan. However,
if you haven't decided on taking a pathway yet or if you're thinking about doing a pathway between IGETC or CSU Breadth, I highly recommend it. It's a really great option to make you eligible, not only for Cal Lu, but for other institutions, but it also
if you complete those pathways, then that means that you've completed most if not all of your GE requirements.
And so if you come into Cal Lu with a completed IGETC or a completed CSU Breadth,
then you would have met most of our core 21 or GE requirements, with the exception of two classes, one being an upper religion upper division religion course,
and for the, IGETC it would be an additional language course and for the CSU Breadth, it would be an additional humanities course.
So if you have any questions about what these pathways are or if you've never heard of them before, feel free to reach out to us at the transfer team. We'll be happy to point you in the right direction.
We also have articulation agreements, especially within VCCCD at Moorpark, Oxnard, Ventura, we have what we call articulation agreements with every major that we offer at Cal Lu. So if you're interested in Biology, we have a paper that says a little form that says, "These are the courses
that are offered at Cal Lu. These are the courses, the same courses that you can take pretty much at Moorpark, Ventura, Oxnard that will meet those requirements.
And we really recommend students take a look at those articulation agreements because if you're able to take those courses at a community college
on top of your GE's, then you'd be coming in on a great foot at Cal Lu, so that you're ready to jump into your major courses,
and your upper division major courses as well. So if you have any questions or would like to look at, at a specific articulation agreement, please feel free to reach out to the transfer team
or myself or even Diana. We'll all point you in the right direction to get one of those agreements.
Okay, so now on to the requirements for the traditional transfer program, in order to have a complete application, you would need to submit your Common application,
official transcripts from all colleges and universities that you've attended. If you've only attended a college within the VCCCD, we would just need a transcript an official transcript from the VCCCD. However,
let's say you went to a four year before or a different community college before we would need all of those official transcripts.
We would also need a letter of recommendation. So those are the three items you need to submit in order to have a complete application for the traditional transfer program.
And our admission requirements include a 2.75 GPA, at least 30 or more transferable units, have completed college level English with a C or better, and have completed at least intermediate algebra or higher. So anything from Intermediate Algebra, to college algebra, stats, calc or above.
So if that sounds like it's ringing all the right bells for you, then you're eligible to apply for the traditional transfer program at Cal Lu.
Now moving on to the Bachelor's Degree for Professionals program.
This program has a different application. The application can actually be found on our website. If you just look up Bachelor's Degree for Professionals, there will be an Apply Now button. And that's where you can access the online application. It's shorter than the Common application.
Again, just because it's a different, it's a different program different requirements. You will need to submit that application, official transcripts from all institutions, a current resume, have at least a 2.25 GPA,
roughly two to three years of work experience. Now this requirement
is a soft requirement because we understand that even though the professionals program is designed for working professionals, people who are working during the day who want to take classes in the evening. Sometimes we have parents
who want to come in and do the evening program just because it best fits their schedule because they're taking care of their kids during the day, right, so that two to three years work experience requirement it's a soft requirement. Only if you've worked
you know, to just have that reflected in your resume. If not, I wouldn't get too hung up on that requirement itself.
And have at least 24 transferable college credits.
So again, this is much different than the requirements for the traditional daytime program two different programs. So whatever you feel best fits your needs just make sure you are attentive of to which requirements are needed for which program.
Okay, so now I'm going to go over the scholarships that we offer for our traditional transfer program.
So, the first being our Transfer Achievement scholarship. All of these scholarships are available to all students who apply. It's just whether or not, right,
they apply to you and you'll see what I mean in a little bit. So for the transfer achievement scholars it's our full tuition scholarship
that is reserved just for transfer students. It is a competitive scholarship. So in order to be eligible for the scholarship, you must submit all of your application materials for the traditional transfer program by February 15.
That is our deadlines for consideration. Once we have all of your application materials by February 15
we will review the applicants who have submitted their application materials to be considered for that scholarship and really what that scholarship
is it's reserved for our top tier pool of our transfer pool. So we're looking at everything from units, to GPA, extracurricular activities,
personal statement, we're looking at your application as a whole and we are inviting the top tier of our transfer pool, who has applied thus far
we're inviting them to come will virtually come to campus and compete for that scholarship. So if you want to be considered for the full tuition scholarship submit your application materials by February 15.
And
notifications will be sent out typically within two to three weeks, whether or not you are invited to compete for the scholarship and then you know, that event will take place and a couple of weeks after, notifications will be sent out to who has been awarded
the full tuition scholarship.
The next is our Visual and Performing Arts scholarship and what had I had mentioned earlier, is you know if these scholarships apply to you if you are someone who
has a musical interest or hobby or you know, does performing arts or art and you know if you have an interest or or even majoring in any of those
you know,
disciplinaries then then please apply for the visit performing arts scholarship. I believe the deadline is also February 15, Diana, you can correct me.
Diana's actually the one who oversees the scholarship. Am I, am I correct? Great. Perfect. So that award people up to $30,000. And so in order to be eligible
I think there's a separate application online for the VAPA fellowship, so be sure to submit that before February 15.
And I believe there are also additions attached to that scholarship or portfolio submissions, depending on which discipline you're kind of looking at. Diana do you want to add something?
Diana Hernandez: Yes, I just add that they can fill out
Nazareth: I just want to make sure, Diana you sounded a little choppy. I just wanted to make sure that did anyone else hear Diana choppy or was that just me?
Karla: Oh, yeah, I couldn't hear her either.
Diana: Okay, no thank you for letting me know. Is this better? Can you guys hear me? Okay great so the visual performing arts scholarships. I did just want to your students know that they can now go up to $30,000 in tuition, and so regardless of immigration status, this is yet another scholarship you can receive that will
help
the entire tuition
as you see down below. And that may be getting a little bit ahead but the tuition itself is a little bit over $45,000 and this is something that would be a scholarship that covers that entire cost.
Nazareth: Thank you Diana. So just to recap, now we have. I know it says up to 30,000 but we actually have now up to full tuition,
and as Diana had mentioned, regardless of citizenship status eligible for pretty much all of all of these scholarships that are right here.
So thank you Diana for adding that. Next is one of our most popular scholarships or transfer students, pretty much all of our undergraduate students take advantage of is our Public Price Promise.
Essentially what that means is that if you are accepted, if you apply and are accepted to one of the six eligible UC's that we have this agreement with you are automatically awarded that scholarship
which is $28,182. The six UC's that we have this agreement with is UC Davis, UC Santa Barbara, Berkeley, San Diego,
Irvine, and I'm missing one. I always forget one.
Diana: I think you're missing Los Angeles.
Nazareth: UCLA. I don't think I mentioned is UCLA. I don't how I was missing UCLA.
But those six, one always escapes me one way or another. So any of those six and we have it for additional information for that as well. If you forget which of those six are. But if you're
a part of a TAG program with Moorpark or if you are doing the IGETC
and get accepted to one of the six UC's, we just need one acceptance letter that shows that you are accepted to one of these UC's for the same semester that you're interested in applying to Cal Lu.
If you show us this acceptance letter you're automatically awarded a scholarship. So the only
caveat is that you have to be accepted to one of those six UC's. There are a couple other UC's that don't fall within this scholarship so make sure it's one of those six,
and make sure that it's for the same semester that you're applying to Cal Lu. So if you're applying to Cal Lu for fall make sure that you're applying to this UC for fall for that same year,
right. The next is our academic merit scholarship any student replies to Cal Lu is automatically considered. There's no additional
application or anything. This is solely based off of your GPA and units. So once you submit your application us the admission counselors on our end will calculate roughly based off of your units and GPA,
yourself of your academic merit, what scholar, what amount, you'll be awarded for that scholarship, which can go up to $20,000.
And last but not least is our Congregation Partners in Education and basically what that means is that if you're a part of any type of congregation or religious group who offers scholarships
we can match that up to 2500 dollars. Sometimes students aren't aware if their church does this or their congregation does this so it never hurts to ask, but if so like I said, Cal Lu can match it up to 2500 dollars.
And so the average financial aid package that a student receives is about a little over $37,000. 97% of our students receive financial aid assistance.
So very little a very small portion of our students actually pay this tuition out of pocket. You know, again, as Diana had mentioned, it's a little over 40
a little couple hundred over $45,000 right, and so we understand that we are a private institution, we get it, but we have those resources and Diana has additional resources, particularly for our Dreamers students that she is going to be sharing
right after I think the next slide. So don't let that number that sticker price fool you. Don't let it scare you.
On top of these scholarships that you're eligible for there are additional ones just for Dreamers students as well. Diana did you want to add something? I saw you pop in. No? Okay, great.
Okay, so that was our scholarships for our traditional daytime program.
Just as there is a different application process and different requirements, we have different scholarship opportunities for our professionals program. So I'm going to go over those for you
real quick. So we have our Fast Track grant. And what this is, is so Cal Lu can offer up to a $5,000 academic year scholarship. So that's about a little over 1200 per term
to students who are qualified students in the Bachelor's Degree for Professionals program. So in order to be eligible for this Fast Track grant you have to submit an application to the professionals program.
Oh, I believe.
I forgot the other
requirements are for the Fast Track grant but there are certain requirements, certain applications, certain documents that you have to submit. Whether or not those are applicable to our Dreamers students, Diana I don't know if you have the answer for that.
But
we have that fast track. Oh, Diana, do you wanna add something?
Diana: All of our Dreamers students are eligible for the Fast Track.
Nazareth: That's
okay, that's what I want to make sure. So again,
up to $5,000 per academic year again roughly
1200, 1250 per term. We also have our ADT pledge. ADT is the Associate's Degree for Transfer. So maybe you're not following the IGETC. Maybe you're not following the CSU Breadth. Maybe you're following the Associate's Degree for Transfer,
you know route for your major. Got lot of different pathways for our transfer students or you're following both on more than one. I've seen students who are following the IGETC, CSU Breadth, and ADT,
you know, which is great. So if you are a student who is following the ADT track for your specific major, Cal Lu does offer a one time
$2,500 scholarship for those individuals who are following the ADT. I will say I forgot to mention this with the IGETC and the CSU Breadth,
whether it's IGETC, CSU Breadth, ADT, be sure that your transcripts note this officially on those documents, on your transcripts, so
be sure to get in contact with your academic advisor at your college or your transfer counselor to make sure, or even the Records Office to make sure that your
whatever pathway that you're following, or set to complete is shown as complete on your transcript when you transfer,
because that will be the only way that we'll know on our end that you are following or have completed the IGETC, CSU Breadth, or ADT for your major. So just make sure that's on your transcript before you transfer.
Okay, so going back to the scholarships. The professionals program also offers the Congregational Partners in Education Award. Again, if you're part of any congregation or church we can measure the 2500 dollars if they offer a scholarship.
We also have the Alumni scholarship. This is actually eligible to both the professionals program and the traditional daytime program. If you are a child or grandchild of an alum from Cal Lu you're automatically awarded $1,000 scholarship.
And our Corporate Partnership scholarship and our Local Government scholarship those scholarships basically means that if you're working for a specific city or an eligible city that we have an agreement with, or a specific employer,
you are accredited $100 per credit. If you have any questions about which specific cities or which specific employers, we can get that information to you.
Just feel free to reach out to us. We have those on our website as well. But those are what those are basically what those scholarships mean. That's what they offer.
And the cost for the professionals program is very different from our traditional daytime program. It's per unit. So $580 per unit plus the
the student fees, which is $55 per term.
Okay, so I know that was a lot of information. We're still not done yet. We have a lot more to go.
Diana is actually going to talk a little bit more about the additional, on top of what I just have discussed, the additional financial assistance we have specifically for our Dreamers students. So I'll go ahead and pass it over to Diana.
Diana: Thank you so much Nazareth, really appreciate it. And really, I just want to reiterate, like reach out.
This is a lot of information. We 100% don't expect you to absorb this and remember all of this and be an expert. We have amazing transfer counselors that are going to be here to help you and aid you through these whole process.
As I'm going through the, the rest of the information I do want to invite both Maria and Naz, if you want to jump in and provide any information
that I missed definitely let me know and especially Maria as a current student you
are using some of these resources and have been part of our community, a really active member and so please feel free to jump in.
But in addition to the financial aid that we're able to offer within or via the institution, you're also going to want to fill out your California Dream application, similar to what you've already been doing or hopefully have been doing
at your community college to receive some sort of financial assistance.
This California Dream application will allow you to qualify potentially for any state aid as well. So, for example, Cal Grant that is something that you qualify for,
but also additional institutional aid that we have specifically just for our Dreamer students. One of those scholarships that we have is what we call our Access Grant. So our Access Grant is specific for first year
and transfer students. And so what we do is we take the average cost of attendance from our CSU,
from our local CSU, so CSUCI and CSU Northridge, we take their average cost of attendance
and we have this Access Grant that will make it so that you can attend Cal Lutheran for the cost of attending the average of these institutions. And so really it allows it to be Cal Lutheran for it to be really affordable for our students.
And we also have something very similar for our professional students. Now the math works a little bit different,
but in essence it's still another scholarship that you would be able to receive potentially in addition.
If you are, for example, to receive our Transfer Achievement scholarship that goes up to full tuition, we may not be able to award you an Access Grant,
since you are now receiving a full tuition scholarship, but really know that this is potentially in addition to any academic scholarship that you may already be receiving.
We also have our housing grant. Now, I don't want to get your hopes up too much, because this is a really competitive scholarship, but it is out there.
So what this housing grant does, or is it allows us to cover the cost of housing for our students. Now again, it is pretty competitive, there is an application process that you would need to go through,
and then a committee will go ahead and review all of that information. We wish we could award it to all of the students that are interested in living on campus just unfortunately
we're not able to do so. But if you are interested in applying definitely reach out to either Nazareth and myself, and we will be more than happy to give you that link,
so that you are at least in the running to be able to get this scholarship.
And something that we are very proud of is, we do have a DACA Renewal Assistance. Now I do want to say that I know not everybody has DACA, but if you do
it's very timely and costly process to be renewing that, and so through different campus initiatives, we've had our HSI Director, Dr. Paloma Vargas that has done different programs for students to
raise funds to help cover their costs, one less thing you have to worry about. We've also had amazing partners in our Student Life
that have done events such as, for example, a taco truck where they bring out a taco truck and all of the money that they get from that event they also send over back to this DACA Renewal Assistance.
But we actually had a donor, a private donor, anonymous donor just donate some money for us to be able to cover the entire DACA renewal cost for all of our students for at least this one year.
And so that assistance is there. It's something that continues to grow. And it's something that we want to continue to grow and hopefully one day soon it won't be a DACA renewal assistance, but a residency or citizenship
assistance or fee assistance, but we do have that, but really know that we as is on the PowerPoint we do stand by our undocumented and Dreamers students to assist them
through the entire process, and this is the application process, the financial aid process, but also moving forward. College is expensive and we want to try to be able to assist our students and try to make it as
less stressful as we can, knowing very well that unfortunately we can't necessarily cover everything for our students, but there is a lot of support for our students as well.
If we can... perfect. And the other thing that we have in terms of support is we do have a pretty robust Dreamer Ally training program for our faculty and staff so I
am proud to be one of the co-founders for this and co-leads for this, and so along with Dr. Cynthia Duarte, who is a professor in our Sociology department as well,
as our director for the Center of Equality and Justice or for equality and justice,
we got together and we said, "Hey, this is something that needs to happen on our campus. This is something our students are asking for.
This is something that they need to know who has an ally on this campus," right? It's super stressful to have to go into different
offices and talk about your status, and maybe this is something that you may a want to talk about it may not be
but you want to know is this person going to stand with me? Is this person and ally? Do they know what I'm talking about, or am I going to spend the first 30 minutes of our meeting explaining what it means
to be undocumented, or what DACA is. And so what this program is it's at a very basic level professors, staff
are pledging that they are there for our students and that they have
done some research, will continue to do research, but we also take it upon ourselves, Dr. Duarte and I to do refreshers for our
allies. So as this information is constantly changing, in the narrative that we are all in, it is has to do with a lot of policy.
And so we do different refreshers to get them the most up to date information so that it's not on you, our students to have to educate your faculty or staff that is something that we do.
And we'll show you our butterfly that we have. And so as you walk around campus and you see different offices, and you're meeting new faculty, you'll start to see their butterfly or our butterfly,
our communities butterfly in their office and you know that they are a safe, a safe person for you to turn to.
We also have our community cupboard. Our community cupboard is our food pantry on campus. It's available for all of our students, whether you live on campus or live off campus,
and it's really an awesome program we have ways that our students are able to write down what type of food, or even just
items that they need. So it doesn't necessarily have to do with just food. It could be, for example, toiletries, hygiene products, anything along those lines,
and it is pretty stocked up I would say 100% of the time. Maybe like 98% of the time, right, we also need to be able to make our runs, but it is definitely stopped and we're always looking
to get student feedback on what are we missing, what else can we put in here that we can just provide, and it's 100% confidential. There's no one you have to check in with. There's no one that you have to tell that you are using these services.
And if you are comfortable. We do have Elizabeth, who is our organizer. She is amazing in our community cupboard. She also has
grocery cards that you can go and ask her for, she won't ask questions, you can just say, "Hey, can I get a grocery card either to Trader Joe's," which is very close to us or to Vons or Ralphs,
and she'll give that to you. We also have meal vouchers so that you're able to go and maybe enjoy your meal in the Commons on us.
And they'll just go ahead and add those to your student ID. So it doesn't look any different than it would for any other student, you just go and are able to enjoy a meal with your
fellow students because our Dreamers students are exempt from having a meal plan.
Now if you want that meal plan, you are able to have it, but it's not something that is forced because we recognize that may be an additional cost and we have the community cupboard.
And your we do have communal kitchens and all of our residence halls, so that you're able to go through and use those services as well.
We have Together We DREAM. That is a student club and it is for students that identify as
or are I shouldn't say identify, are first generation in their family to attend college that are undocumented that are coming from mixed status families or our allies.
And so these group of students, they get together pretty much on a bi-weekly basis and just
they could do resource meetings. I'm the proud advisor of this club. So I'm very biased about this club, but it is a wonderful community that our students have and so they
are coming together to share resources with each other, to gain professional experience or professional development, but also just to build community with each other.
We, as in the Dreamer community, we have well, we will be having bi-weekly meetings and so we'll have an in person socially distanced everyone wearing a mask,
and kind of RSVP, so I know who's there meetings, but also virtual meetings and this is what our students asked so
a little bit ago towards the middle of the semester, I said, "What, what do you guys want to see I can create programming
every single day if you want it. But if you don't want a there's there's no need for that." And so what they said is "We want bi-weekly meetings
and alternate between in person and virtual," and we do have a really great community of students. They are transfer students, first
year students, professional students, even graduate students are coming together and we do have a core group of point of contact. So that is
DACA that I've mentioned. Elena, who is an amazing resource for students. She's the Director of our Student Support Services
and myself that tend to be the four allies that will go to all of these meetings and the students want to see more allies we'll invite them, but it really is a confidential space. It's not advertised anywhere.
There's really only two people that have the list. So really being able to find all of our students I'm one of them, and the other is our AP Dr. Matt Ward.
But that's it, nobody else has a way to contact students. And so really confidentiality and protection is one of our highest priority for our students.
And the other thing I want to make sure that you all know about is 2-1-1. So 2-1-1 is a toll free number 24/7 for social services. So if you
are looking to receive some assistance with child care, medical care, maybe you need help paying your rent, paying the bills, maybe you need help
with community service, really anything along those lines they are going to be there and they provide free referrals to anyone in the community. You just dial 2-1-1. Some of them may have
citizenship requirements through to receive their services, but most of them don't. I used to work for 2-1-1 and so I know that they do have an amazing database
for anyone in the community not just Dreamer students to go and get access, and that is something we are also encouraging our students to utilize.
Now, these, this is our butterfly that I was mentioning. And so the butterfly that you see there it is by an artist whose name always escapes me, but I believe her name is Fabiola and she gave us
the right to edit this amazing work that she did, which is that butterfly to our CLU colors.
And so we have our point of contacts. These are different staff within the community that
we meet even more regularly than our regular allies, and we are like, "What? What are we missing? What do we need to do?" And so these are going to be kind of the driving force of all
Dreamer initiatives on our campus and we send out or we provide this list of allies
to our students that way they know A, what we look like, so they see us on campus if they need to go to our office they know and I want to keep an eye out for and kind of make it a little bit less intimidating.
And so as you see the first five so Kathy's in Financial Aid. She's an amazing human. I don't want to put her aside, but you'll see the first five that being Dr. Ward, myself, Dr. Duarte,
Elena, and Dr. Vargas that tend the core group that are always going to meetings with our students really trying to create that sense of community for students and they're always available to chat. But you'll see that butterfly all around our campus.
And without further ado, I'm going to pass it back over to Nazareth.
So we can introduce our wonderful Maria and get an opportunity to chat with her.
Nazareth: Okay. Well, thank you. Diana I appreciate you
catching us all up on the resources we
have for our Dreamers students. Now we are going to transition to a little bit of a Q&A with Maria. Maria thank you so much for being here for taking the time out of your day to participate in this. I'll go ahead and start asking you to introduce yourself. So your
name, well we know your name, your name, your major where you transferred from and what made you choose Cal Lu.
Karla: Maria I don't think we can hear you.
Diana: Audio and reset.
Nazareth: Do you have headphones? I don't think we can hear you
still Maria. Take your time it's fine.
Diana: We hear some static. You may be...
I don't know if you have like another microphone that you could use?
Karla: Maria do you want to come back to the meeting?
Maybe that works.
Thank you.
So, in the meantime, I just wanted to recap, a little bit more on the information that you both provided. Cal Lu definitely offers many opportunities for Dreamers from what we were able to hear. Classes that you take at Moorpark College can count it's just a matter of making sure that
you know you're aligning with the curriculums that they have and the articulation that they have with Moorpark College.
The Common application and for it needs that you have with that is the letter of recommendation. So many of our students we encourage you to create those partnerships with staff, faculty on campus to make sure that you get that letter of recommendation you need for the Common application.
And another part is that you not only offer your traditional route of transfer but you also have the professional degree, which are not only people who are working benefit from, but essentially, people who
may have kids at home and they will prefer to attend school night.
So yeah, I have heard many over students who may be in that experience and they definitely want to continue their career at a flexible path. So definitely night school is something that they can look forward to. And then I was amazed to hear about the scholarships that you all have and
you know you noted that you understand that tuition is pricey at Cal Lu. So we have all those resources in place for our students. For instance, the Transfer Achievement scholarship, which is due February 15, right and that one can cover your...
So we have Maria joining us. I'll recap a little bit more later. If anything, but Maria. Let's do some testing to see if we can hear you.
Maria: Can you guys hear me now?
Karla: Yes.
Maria: Sorry about that I don't know what happened. I was just in a Zoom right before.
Nazareth: Thank you so much for for, you know, troubleshooting appreciate you sticking through with it trying to get back to it. Very much appreciate it. So yeah, like I said, we'll just jump into it. So your name, your major, where you transferred from, and what made you choose Cal Lu.
Maria: So I'm actually senior. Well, my name is Maria Botello and I'm a senior at Cal Lu. I was supposed to set to graduate this semester, half a year early, but Covid hit. So I couldn't fulfill my internship
and my other some other courses. So I'll be graduating next semester but I only have one class to take.
And I transferred from Moorpark College actually, and as Nazareth spoke about student support services at Cal Lu, I was actually in the EOPS program at Moorpark College and
actually enjoyed to the max. And Student Support Services is right on spot with EOPS and like they spoke about Elena, which is the person in charge at
EOPS, Student Support Services, sorry, and they help you with anything you need help with whether it's advising, getting help with homework, going there to study, they have their own private room, they have workshops.
My major is Criminal Justice, and I am looking to work with youth at risk and probationers.
Regardless of, you know, documentation, I still have hope.
But as she said
and Diana don't let the price you know,
become a burden with you. I had the same issue with money and seeing the price and I was able to get grants and scholarships, and aside from the ones the school offered,
there's always options out there. I follow, I'm sure a lot of you are on Instagram or social media, there's a lot of Dreamer and allies resources on there, Immigrant Rising is a popular organization that offers scholarships for students as well.
Wells Fargo offer scholarships for Dreamers all the time. I haven't got any but I keep applying because you know it's worth a try, but there's a bunch of resources. So don't let a price fool you.
Are there any questions?
Nazareth: Oh, I'll keep asking a few questions,
Maria. [Maria]: Yeah. [Nazareth]: So what made you choose Cal Lu. So, I know you said you were
kind of hesitant about, you know, the price and what that looks
like, but what ultimately you know make your decision or make you feel more comfortable and coming to Cal Lu despite those worries.
Maria: So I actually took a tour, two tours no, yeah, once tour. And I actually met with Diana and
the other tour I took with my friend who went there and I felt very welcomed being a Dreamer. And we had a private meeting too with just Dreamers, and felt like a very safe space and given that the classes are smaller
in size I felt that the teachers would have more communication or understanding of which how each student worked and what they needed help with,
whereas, like I had looked into CSUN for example, and their class portion size is alot larger and I felt that I wouldn't probably get the same attention I would get at Cal Lu, you know, being smaller size of class if I needed help, for example.
Nazareth: Great. Well, thank you, Maria.
So how are you involved on campus? Are you involved on campus, and what resources or clubs or organizations would you recommend to fellow Dreamer students, prospective students?
Maria: So I attend
Together with DREAM club. I try to attend some meetings, I can't because I have a job too, but I try to stay involved with student life,
especially with Covid now. I tried to follow a lot of the pages or social media due to the fact that I'm a commuter student as well. So it's hard living off campus and
staying on top of things that go on on campus, but I try and follow all the pages so I stay on top of any career courses that are offered like workshops or student life. I attended the Paletas at the Park, and they gave us like the blankets that we can have a picnic with.
What else did I attend? I've attended like two other things on campus, but it's given to the fact that I followed the pages to to stay on top of the clubs and everything.
I help Diana a lot with Dreamer workshops or webinars
if I can to give perspective into other students, especially being a first gen or having that fear of being undocumented and not having the resources that other students would have like having FAFSA and stuff like that.
So I like to put it out there and help Diana, you know, be be a voice too.
Nazareth: Well that's awesome. I know Diana appreciates it. We definitely appreciate it. So you have, we have an ally and we really appreciate it.
So we spoke a little bit about, you know, the things that you've attended and you know how you like to stay connected to campus, even though you're a commuter,
are there any off campus resources that you utilize or look out for or is it mainly all on campus?
Maria: So I, I did use, so campus does have the
I think it's called
CAPS or like
they offer several or one or two sessions for free. And I just thought you know it's it's healthy to have a clean mental health and,
you know, with everything going on to not to not be afraid of expressing how you feel and campus well school offers that but it's in Westlake Village. It's not on campus. So I've got an opportunity to use that as well and I like it.
Nazareth: Yeah, yeah, our CAPS office our Counseling and Psychological Services Office. It's actually all I think all sessions are free, unless they changed it. I'm not sure. Possible, but I believe all sessions have been for our students.
So thank you for sharing that Maria. Now you know as a transfer student, particularly from VCCCD, particularly from Moorpark,
did you have any concerns about, you know, courses matriculating over or, you know, how was that, how was that transition process from
a college to a university? Was it kind of like a culture shock or, you know, was it, how was your transition and what advice would you give to other transfer students coming into
four year university?
Maria: Um...
transferring over,
so academically wise to make sure that you have the courses you need and that way you're not stressing about it last minute to try and fulfill those courses. So don't wait till last minute but
I took like I had like 130 units which I was at Moorpark for a long time,
but I believe you guys only take 60 or 90 so not all transferred, but I did have a Math course that I have checked
due to the name of it. It didn't transfer to Cal Lu because I took it from Oxnard.
So I was told once that it would transfer and then once I got to school it didn't transfer. So I feel like just to double check and stuff like that. It's just little stuff like that
may kind of put you out of stress. I mean, it wasn't a major issue, but like transferring into a smaller class was definitely a shock to me because I was so used to
I mean the class sizes aren't super large at Moorpark, but definitely compared to Cal Lu. It's different. So to see, not so many faces in a classroom was like, "Whoa.
Like the teachers actually like get a pick on us like you have to participate." So definitely, I always like participating in class anyways, but
there's days where you feel like you know you don't want to participate, whereas at Cal Lu, you have to since it's a limited number of students. So I like that.
Nazareth: Yes, the professor's know your name. So if you...
Maria: Yeah.
[Nazareth]: If you're not in class, they will call you out. [Maria]: Yes. Yeah.
Nazareth: Great. Well, thanks Maria. Karla if you have any questions that you feel like your students would want to know about, particularly from a student experience, please feel free to ask.
And then Diana if you have any additional questions. So I'll just take a moment here to see if you have anything that you would like to ask Maria.
Karla: Yeah. Maria what do you do for fun? What do you like to do?
Maria: I'm actually like photography, hiking, and of course we live in Southern California so we have all the above.
And I just like interacting with also, I feel like being in that culture at Cal Lu, we have such a diverse community
and clubs. So we always have events going on, especially during, so we have a chapel hour actually a Cal Lu on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 11:15 to 12:15
and sometimes we have like food trucks and stuff or events going on and it's like free food. So it's fun to interact with people and get to know people and that's all me.
Karla: Oh my god, that's great to hear. I'm so happy that you have found connections over there at Cal Lu, you know. And you transferred from Moorpark College and were part of the EOPS program. I it really warmed my heart to hear that you were a part
here too. So yes I would like to thank you Maria for sharing your experience. Nazareth and also Diana thank you for sharing about what opportunities are out there for Cal Lu and our Dreamers.
And that concludes the meeting for today. Thank you, everyone. Oh, actually, we have this slide just in case if you have any questions, feel free to contact them.
Any other last words Nazareth or Diana?
I didn't know you had a last slide.
Nazareth: No, it's fine. It's fine. That's why. That's why they're just a point of contact either myself or Diana, feel free to contact us will be here to help with any questions.
Maria: And, if any students are ever have questions from a student's perspective you can always ask them for my email. I'm more than happy to help anybody.
Karla: Will do. Thank you so much. Maria, and Nazareth, and Diana for joining us today. This concludes the webinar tonight. Bye, everyone.
Maria: Thank you. Bye.