Balancing a job to pay for tuition and day care while fitting in time to attend school are just some of the struggles student parents have to face.

Sarah Jefferson, a University graduate, spoke Wednesday at the Women’s Center Brown Bag Series about her own personal struggles as a student with a child.

“My senior year of college, I got pregnant and didn’t know exactly what to do,” Jefferson said.

Jefferson, who had to drop out of the University in 2006, eventually came back and graduated in 2009. She said since having her son, Jonah, she wants to help other students who are mothers and inform the public about the hardships student mothers face.

“In 2009, there was a 4 percent increase in unemployment among single women homes,” Jefferson said. “A lot of people would attribute that to the slow economy, but for these women, if they were getting a chance to get an education, there may be a chance that they would be able to get better jobs or not risk unemployment.”

Jefferson said the average single mother’s income is $21, 284, which is around the average cost to attend the University for one year.

“That’s not even including housing or utilities or day care costs or other costs that come with having a child,” Jefferson said.

Mary Krueger, the director of the Women’s Center, said the University needs to realize that student parents are becoming a trend in college.

“We’re living with an old idea of what a college student is,” Krueger said. “Bowling Green State University is traditionally a residential University, and so students, historically, have lived on campus for the most part. If you live on campus, you generally are not a parent, not married, and with population trends in general, there’s just more diversity in who college students are. Our thinking has not quite caught up to that reality yet.”

Jefferson said some of the biggest struggles student mothers face at the University include limited on-campus resources and day care.

“Having a child and not being able to live on campus and having limited time on campus, you don’t have access to the same things regular students have. You’re missing on computer labs, the library and the writing center,” Jefferson said

She said one of the hardest parts of having a child and attending college is finding appropriate housing with no help from the University.

“When I was moving back, I had called the campus to find out if there’s anything available and they gave me no information,” Jefferson said. “I had to go out, on my own, and find the resources to find a place for my son and me.”

She said the on-campus day care is also an added stress because of its strict entrance requirements.

“If you have an infant, you’re already out,” Jefferson said. “Most day cares have the 24 hour rule, so if your son or daughter gets a fever, you have to keep them out of day care for 24 hours, so that’s like two days of classes.”

Jefferson said to help student parents, the University could offer more online and night classes.

“Some mothers I talked to said if there were more classes online, that would make their lives a whole lot easier,” Jefferson said. “But there’s only certain classes and certain degrees that you can pursue online at BGSU.”

Jefferson, who had an experience where she was asked to leave the Union computer lab because of her son, said the University could offer an area that was more child-friendly where students with children could go and use the computer labs and other on-campus resources.

“As a student, who is also paying tuition, I don’t feel like I should be asked to leave because of my child,” Jefferson said.

Sophomore Quintina Coney, who attended the luncheon, said it is unacceptable that the University does not do enough to help students with children.

“It’s a very important issue,” she said.