AURORA, Colo. — The New Legacy Charter School is helping students balance their education with the responsibilities of being a teen parent.
The alternative high school in Aurora provides parenting students with the skills to raise healthy children and develop college or career readiness. New Legacy works with about 95 teen parents and their siblings to make sure they don’t face the barriers that may be in place. Steven Bartholomew is the executive director of the school that offers support not only for the students, but also for their children.
“We understand how hard it is to be a teen parent,” Bartholomew said. “We’re making sure that they have childcare when they come to school, we’re making sure that when they’re done with high school, they have a great career ahead of them.”
The school uses what they call a “2 Gen” model of education. The high school focuses on serving teen parents with a blended curriculum of traditional courses along with parenting classes. They also have an early learning center on campus so the students can still connect with their children.
“A large majority of our students are coming from low-income communities so it’s important to offer this support,” Bartholomew said. “We still have classes of course but we’re making sure we are supplementing that with things like parenting class, a career pathways class, and an entrepreneurship class… that are setting them up for success after high school.”
According to the school, each student receives one-on-one academic support and opportunities for real-world learning at their own pace. The high school also includes an English-language learning program that combines language skill with literacy and academics.
“We’re meeting our students where they need to be met,” Bartholomew said. “Every student who graduates from Legacy, not only will they have a high school diploma, but they will also have college classes, internships, or be certified in some area of interest to them.”
Lucero Aguilar is a senior and will be graduating from high school in May. She started attending the charter school when she was a junior and her son Emilio was just four months old.
“It was a little scary because you don’t ever think, ‘Oh, I’m going to leave my 4-month-old with childcare and go back to school’,” Aguilar said. “When I found this school, I was like, wait, I can actually go to school, take my baby, get my career started and actually do something for myself instead of just sitting at home and taking care of my kid.”
Aguilar is planning on studying to become a cardiac stenographer—a goal she said she didn’t think was possible after becoming a teen parent.
“It’s hard but it’s manageable,” Aguilar said. “All the teachers support you on a big level, they all want to see you succeed.
Teachers like Jenn Stephens who is a parenting teacher and an advisor at the school. She believes the skills the students learn in her class help them manage being both a student and a parent.
“I think if they’re not able to manage parenting skills at home and the self-care that they need, they’re not going to do well in their math class or in their humanities class,” Stephens said. “We really try to help them manage those things so that they are able to perform at their best in their other classes.
The high school is making sure their students not only graduate with their high school diplomas but internships and certifications to make sure they’re ready for what’s next.
“The national graduation rate for teen parents is around 50 percent, our graduation rate is over 80 percent with our teen parents,” Bartholomew said. “This is not something where you see the fruits of your labor in a month, but look at the generations to come, that’s where we’ll really see what we’ve done and I’m very proud of our students and staff for that.”
More information about the school can be found on their website.