The California Student Opportunity and Access Program
– which provides academic advising to first-generation and
low-income students – received a 25 percent cut in state funding on
Friday.
Hollister – Christian Mercado, a recent graduate of San Benito High School, started his freshman year at the University of California, Davis last week.
The first in his family to attend college, Mercado sought out all the help he could trying to get into the universities of his choice. Mercado attended one-on-one academic advising, pursued advice on his schedule, and asked for help in the classes he needed.
But one of the programs that provided these services and helped Mercado get where he is today faces cuts in state funding.
The California Student Opportunity and Access Program – which provides academic advising to first-generation and low-income students – received a 25 percent cut in state funding on Friday. The $2.2 million reduction was part of $703 million in line-item vetoes erased from the budget by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
These cuts could prevent future first-generation students from getting counseling and advice they need – and serve as a barrier to their pursuit of a higher degree.
“This will have a fairly significant impact to our region,” Superintendent Stan Rose said at a Board of Trustees meeting Wednesday.
The Cal-SOAP program provides college advice to students locally, with one of its 16 projects operating out of Gilroy and serving San Benito County students. Erin Gemar, project director of South County Cal-SOAP, said last year the offices served more than 12,000 students. This year they were planning to expanding services to 20,000 students, but with the cuts it’s unknown if that will be successful.
It’s currently unknown how these cuts will take shape or how much they will affect San Benito County students, Gemar said.
She will meet with the other project directors in the coming week to plan out how the 25 percent cut would be absorbed. They expect to have a better idea of what the cuts will mean in around two weeks, she said.
“We’ll find out how (the cuts) are going to affect South County Cal-SOAP,” Gemar said. “But until we have a meeting, it’s a little too early to say.”
Claudia Valencia, who serves as the Cal-SOAP counselor at San Benito High School, said she’s nervous the cuts might negatively affect the students who need the services the most.
“My concern is just, these are the students that need the most assistance, the most help, and they are being neglected,” Valencia said. “They are going to be greatly affected by this.”
San Benito High School’s program offers one-on-one college counseling for around 200 students each year, Valencia said. In addition, she provides financial aid advising for all students.
The Cal-SOAP program also offers programs for parents, giving financial aid advice in Spanish and English and providing informational sessions.
“Parents are key to their students’ success and they need to be involved, so we try to accommodate their needs,” Valencia said.
Valencia said she worries that if the program gets cut, many students will fall through the cracks.
Overall, the program is about improving college access, especially for those students most at risk of not pursuing a higher degree.
“Our No. 1 objective is to increase the number of students who go to college,” Gemar said.
Although Mercado always had plans to attend college, the programs provided by Cal-SOAP helped him a lot, he said. Mercado said he and many of his friends attributed much of their success in applying to colleges to Cal-SOAP.
“Right now they reach out to a lot and people take advantage of that,” Mercado said. “Every person that I know who has been in Cal-SOAP, we’re all grateful for the access it gave us.”
