Student, Auburn University Honors College & Public and One Health Program
Doctoral student, Tulane University; adjunct professor, Auburn University
Despite interest in attending, pregnant and parenting mothers face barriers to higher education. As this population faces high rates of economic insecurity, this is concerning as higher education is a pathway to increase income.
Strengthening federal legal guidance may provide the framework for institutions to act on appropriate accommodations such as flexible assignment submission and attendance policies which may help students overcome barriers to attending.
Recently, there have been several new developments in the legal landscape surrounding accommodation requirements for pregnant people including the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, 2024 Title IX Rules and Regulations, and the Family Medical Leave Act. These accommodations might make it more feasible for pregnant and parenting students to attend higher education. Still, many student parents remain unprotected.
In order to improve accommodations for pregnant and parenting students in Oklahoma, it’s critical to understand their value for this student population, as well as the national and state legal landscape that surrounds them.
18% of undergraduate students are raising children while enrolled and 74% of those students are women.1Anderson et al., “Who Are Undergraduates with Dependent Children? An Updated Overview of Student-Parent Characteristics Using 2020 Data.” Student-Parent Action through Research Knowledge (SPARK) Collaborative, 2024. Pregnant and parenting people in the university setting, particularly student mothers, face economic, institutional, and social barriers to success.2Cornett, Navigating College and Parenthood: Insights from the Fall 2021 Student Financial Wellness Survey, Trellis Strategies, 2023; Yates, Raising Expectations for Institutional Intervention: What Colleges and Universities Can Do to Support Student-Parent Success (Washington, DC: American Council on Education, 2024); Hartman-O’Connell et al., “Student Caregivers Face Challenging Dual Responsibilities: The Unique Experience of Students Who Are Family Caregivers,” AARP Research, 2020. Success in higher education is an instrument for economic mobility across generations.3The Pew Charitable Trusts, “Economic Mobility Project Releases Comprehensive Study of Income Mobility in the U.S.,” press release, February 20, 2008.
Institutional Barriers
Institutional barriers like inflexible attendance policies and rigid class requirements are compounded by a lack of education on how to seek support effectively for caregiving needs.4Moss et al., “Our Hopes for Student-Caregivers.” About Campus: Enriching the Student Learning Experience, 30 no. 6 (2026): 17-22. Student parents perceive universities as being unsupportive and lacking in resources or policies to support them.5Hartman-O’Connell et al., “Student Caregivers Face Challenging Dual Responsibilities, 2020. As one student parent shared: “I didn’t really want to associate myself too much with being an [Omitted] alum. I know that’s sad to say, but there were times where I just felt so out on an island that I was doing everything on my own, that I was going to graduate and not look back and not think about it again.”6Moss et al., “Our Hopes for Student-Caregivers,” 2026.
Economic Barriers
Economic constraints due to their caregiving status can further impact students’ success at university.7Cornett, Navigating College and Parenthood, 2023. Students with dependents spend between six and seven thousand more annually in non-tuition expenses while having fewer financial resources than their non-parenting peers.8Cornett, Navigating College and Parenthood, 2023. To afford their tuition and basic needs, student parents report relying on their current employment and risky borrowing practices, as opposed to their non-parent peers who more predominately rely on savings and familial support.9Cornett, Navigating College and Parenthood, 2023. This can make affording emergency expenses challenging and result in gaps in income. These barriers can be exacerbated by a lack of support from universities in navigating financial assistance programs.10Yates, Raising Expectations for Institutional Intervention, 2024.
Social Barriers
The responsibilities of parenthood, employment, and academics often leave students with very little time to spend studying, socializing, and seeking support, which are key aspects of success in college.11Conway et al., “Time Poverty and Parenthood: Who Has Time for College?” AERA Open 7 (2021). Additionally, the time constraints around students’ availability are often incompatible with programs that have limited class time offerings or inflexible internship or residency schedules. Despite earning better grades, student caregivers are far less likely to complete their degrees than their non-parenting independent and dependent peers, due to these structural challenges.12Anderson et al., “Who Are Undergraduates with Dependent Children?”, 2024.
Effectively providing accommodations or modifications can alleviate some of the institutional, economic, and social barriers to higher education while projecting support from the university. The majority of pregnant and parenting students desire accommodations like flexible attendance policies, changes in class modality, policies that define dedicated spaces for lactation, and assignment flexibility.13Hartman-O’Connell et al., “Student Caregivers Face Challenging Dual Responsibilities, 2020.
Accommodations play a foundational role in a broader support framework for pregnant and parenting students at universities. When combined with financial guidance and social support, accommodations can help meet persistent unmet needs including financial needs, lack of community, and difficulty meeting inflexible requirements.
Changes to Title IX and recent laws such as the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act and the PUMP Act have aimed to increase access to accommodations for some reproductive and parenting events in university settings. However, there is a lack of consensus on how these changes interface to require accommodations for university students experiencing a reproductive event and what the appropriate mechanisms are for enforcement of accommodations, particularly those regarding Title IX.14McNee, “Pregnancy Discrimination in Higher Education: Accommodating Student Pregnancy,” Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights and Social Justice 20 (2013): 63.
Title IX: Title IX is the primary law that requires accommodations for pregnancy and related conditions in secondary and post-secondary institutions. Under the law, discrimination on the basis of pregnancy, childbirth, false pregnancy, termination of pregnancy, and related conditions at public schools is illegal.
As interpreted in the 2020 Rule, universities are required to provide reasonable adjustments like larger desks, elevator access, or allowing frequent trips to the restroom. Universities must excuse any absences due to pregnancy or childbirth and allow students to return to their same academic and extracurricular status before any medical leave associated with pregnancy.
However, the now-vacated 2024 Title IX rules would have strengthened weaknesses in the 2020 Rules in relation to protections for pregnant and parenting students.15The Pregnant Scholar, “Summary of Key Changes to the Title IX Regulations on Pregnancy and Parental Status: A Comparison of the 2024 and 2020 Rules with Best Practice Recommendations,” The Pregnant Scholar Initiative, The Center for WorkLife Law, 2025. The 2024 Rule would have lowered the documentation barriers when seeking accommodations for a pregnancy or parenting event, provided more clarity on what is considered a pregnancy-related condition, stated an explicit right to lactation space, and required more education on the Title IX Office’s role in accessing leave and accommodations for pregnancy and parenting. 16The Pregnant Scholar, “Summary of Key Changes to the Title IX Regulations on Pregnancy and Parental Status,” 2025.
Education is often provided on Title IX’s other roles on campus regarding sex discrimination. However, students report not being aware of the accommodations process for pregnancy and pregnancy related conditions.17Hartman-O’Connell et al., “Student Caregivers Face Challenging Dual Responsibilities, 2020; Yates, Raising Expectations for Institutional Intervention, 2024.
Americans with Disabilities Act: The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires that an employer or federally-funded organizations, including public universities, provide reasonable accommodations to those with disabilities and prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability. While pregnancy itself is not a disability under the ADA, it may give rise to pregnancy-related disabilities or rise to the level of a disability. For instance, Maternal Mental Health is a leading cause of disability among women of reproductive age.18National Center for Education Statistics, “Postbaccalaureate Enrollment,” Condition of Education, U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, 2022. This difference leads to confusion and barriers to seeking accommodations for pregnancy, as the process for ADA accommodations and Title IX accommodations are often housed in different offices at universities.
Pregnant Workers Fairness Act: The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA) requires employers to provide reasonable accommodations to employees or applicants with pregnancy or pregnancy-related medical conditions. This law provides the most comprehensive right to accommodations for pregnancy and related conditions at the federal level. However, it does not apply to students, and there is no consensus on its applicability to students who also work for a university.
There are no specific laws regarding pregnant or parenting students in Oklahoma. However, the Oklahoma Senate Education Committee is interested in the accommodations available for pregnant students and young families.19Oklahoma State Senate, “Committee Studies Accommodations Provided to Oklahoma’s Pregnant Students and Young Families,” press release, October 14, 2021. In 2021, the committee held a study on accommodations provided to Oklahoma’s pregnant students and young families requested by Sen. Mary Boren.20Oklahoma State Senate, “Committee Studies Accommodations,” 2021.
Accommodations provided for pregnant and parenting university students under the Americans with Disability Act and Title IX are predominately evaluated in law reviews and policy briefs. A study on the implementation of Title IX regarding pregnancy and parenting in the Chicago Public School System found that Title IX is not upheld consistently due to a lack of awareness of legal requirements.21Jain et al., “Title IX Experiences of Pregnant and Parenting Youth in Chicago: A Qualitative Study,” Journal of School Health 93 (2023): 289–96. This conclusion is also supported by legal reviews on Title IX and pregnancy, which suggest that the legislative framework for pregnancy and related accommodations lacks cohesion and consensus).22McNeeley, “Title IX and Equal Educational Access for Pregnant and Parenting Girls.” Wisconsin Women’s Law Journal 22, no. 2 (2007); McNee, “Pregnancy Discrimination in Higher Education,” 2013.
Many Oklahoma universities have sections of their Title IX/Equal Opportunity and Compliance websites dedicated to pregnancy and pregnancy-related accommodation.23See The University of Oklahoma, Oklahoma Christian University, Oklahoma State University, University of Center Oklahoma. The Single Mothers Academic Resource Team (SMART) program at Rose State College in Oklahoma demonstrates the impact strong university support can have with a 79% retention rate, compared to 37% nationally, for student parents involved in the program.24Oklahoma State Senate, “Committee Studies Accommodations,” 2021; Gault et al., “Understanding the Student Parent Experience: The Need for Improved Data Collection on Parent Status in Higher Education,” Briefing Paper C485 (Washington, DC: Institute for Women’s Policy Research, September 2020).
While there is little research on the impact of accommodations for pregnant and parenting students under Title IX, research on accommodations for students with disabilities under the ADA can provide a helpful touchpoint. Research shows that students with disabilities, including students with pregnancy-related disabilities, who receive accommodations mandated by the ADA have better academic outcomes than students with disabilities who do not utilize accommodations. This is especially true if the accommodations are utilized early in their academic career and often.25Blasey et al., “Accommodation Use and Academic Outcomes for College Students with Disabilities,” Psychological Reports 126 no. 4 (2023): 1891–1909.
More research is needed on the outcomes of accommodations for pregnancy and parenting at universities as well as the implementation of Title IX accommodations.26Garcia et al., “Correlates of Well-Being and Academic Outcomes Among Student Parents in College During the COVID-19 Pandemic,” Journal of College Student Retention: Research, Theory & Practice 26, no. 4 (2025); Jain et al., “Title IX Experiences of Pregnant and Parenting Youth in Chicago,” 2023. The newly reintroduced Understanding Student Parent Outcomes Act would compel the Department of Education to collect data on student parents’ profiles and conduct a study on how to improve outcomes for student parents.27Understanding Student Parent Outcomes Act of 2025, H.R. 3994, 119th Cong. (2025).
There is a clear need for stronger policies enforcing access to accommodations for pregnant and parenting students. The now-vacated 2024 Title IX Rule would have fulfilled this need for pregnant students, requiring faculty and staff to refer students who disclose pregnancy or pregnancy related conditions to the Title IX Coordinator and inform them of their services.28The Pregnant Scholar, “Summary of Key Changes to the Title IX Regulations on Pregnancy and Parental Status,” 2025.
Even though the 2024 Title IX Rule was vacated, adhering to it provides greater support to student parents and reduces liability on issues that the 2020 Title IX Rule is currently unclear on.29The Pregnant Scholar, “Summary of Key Changes to the Title IX Regulations on Pregnancy and Parental Status,” 2025. States and universities can create greater systems of support by adopting student pregnancy policies in the mold of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act.
While there are no explicit education requirements for students under Title IX, Title IX Coordinators offer primary prevention and awareness programs to students and employees, as required by the Violence Against Women Act.30Hambleton, “Understanding Training vs. Prevention Education Requirements Under the Title IX Regulations and VAWA,” Association of Title IX Administrators (blog), January 29, 2024. The Association for Title IX Administrators recommends that schools provide most employees with training on the identification and reporting of sex-based misconduct.31Hambleton, “Understanding Training vs. Prevention Education Requirements,” 2024. Most universities incorporate this education and training into orientation programming. While not required by law, including information on the process for pregnancy and pregnancy-related accommodations in this education could increase awareness of available accommodations.
An alternative to providing individualized accommodations is the implementation of Universal Design. Universal design entails proactively designing or changing the overall environment to increase access for everyone.32Mole, “A US Model for Inclusion of Disabled Students in Higher Education Settings: The Social Model of Disability and Universal Design,” Widening Participation and Lifelong Learning 14, no. 3 (2013): 62–86. In the context of pregnancy and parenting, this could look like having general flexible attendance policies, not restricting bathroom breaks, and having flexible class modalities for everyone. As one student parent shared, accommodations can go beyond formal processes: “Just saying, ‘Hey, I understand. Yes, you can have an extension on this if your child is sick and you’ve been up all night.’ Or, ‘Yes, we understand if you have to miss class because you’re sick and you’ve been up all night with the child’ are incredibly helpful.”33Moss et al., “Lived Experiences of Student Caregivers,” National College Learning Centers Association Annual Conference, 2024.
While the legal requirements for accommodations, as implemented, are not sufficient to support pregnant and parenting students at universities, institutions should adhere to the Vacated Final Rule while crafting specific supports guided by institutional research. This creates a standard for support while also creating a platform for universities to tailor supports to the unique needs of their student population.
Universities should gather and report on this population, including their experiences with student support offices, accommodations procedures, health outcomes, and educational and career satisfaction. Universities can embed parenting status questions into university-wide surveys to inform support services. This data will allow universities to self-assess opportunities to improve legal compliance and increase institutional support.
Student, Auburn University Honors College & Public and One Health Program
Clara Ragan is studying Political Science, Philosophy, and Public Health at Auburn University. She is an Undergraduate Research Fellow with the Caregiver Initiative, a research and advocacy organization dedicated to improving support for student caregivers. On campus, she is active in rural health outreach and substance use harm reduction.
Doctoral student, Tulane University; adjunct professor, Auburn University
Regan Moss (MPH, Columbia University) is a doctoral student at Tulane and an adjunct with the Auburn University Honors College and Public and One Health Program. At Auburn, she co-directs the Caregiver Initiative and co-leads a research seminar through Alabama Extension on Maternal Health.
Anderson, T., et al. Who Are Undergraduates with Dependent Children? An Updated Overview of Student-Parent Characteristics Using 2020 Data. Student-Parent Action through Research Knowledge (SPARK) Collaborative. 2024. https://www.urban.org/research/publication/who-are-undergraduates-dependent-children.
Blasey, J., C. Wang, and R. Blasey. “Accommodation Use and Academic Outcomes for College Students with Disabilities.” Psychological Reports 126 no. 4 (2023): 1891–1909. https://doi.org/10.1177/00332941221078011.
Cataldi, E. F., C. T. Bennett, and X. Chen. First-Generation Students: College Access, Persistence, and Postbachelor’s Outcomes (NCES 2018 421). U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics. 2018. https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2018/2018421.pdf.
“Committee Studies Accommodations Provided to Oklahoma’s Pregnant Students and Young Families.” Press release, Oklahoma State Senate, October 14, 2021. Accessed September 7, 2025. https://oksenate.gov/press-releases/committee-studies-accommodations-provided-oklahomas-pregnant-students-and-young.
Conway, K. M., C. Wladis, and A. C. Hachey. “Time Poverty and Parenthood: Who Has Time for College?” AERA Open 7. 2021. https://doi.org/10.1177/23328584211011608.
Cornett, Allyson. Navigating College and Parenthood: Insights from the Fall 2021 Student Financial Wellness Survey. Trellis Strategies, 2023. https://www.trellisstrategies.org/wp-content/uploads/dlm_uploads/2023/10/Navigating-College-and-Parenting.pdf.
Hambleton, Mandy. “Understanding Training vs. Prevention Education Requirements Under the Title IX Regulations and VAWA.” Association of Title IX Administrators (blog). January 29, 2024. https://www.atixa.org/blog/understanding-training-vs-prevention-education-requirements-under-the-title-ix-regulations-and-vawa/.
Hartman-O’Connell, I., and L. Skufca. “Student Caregivers Face Challenging Dual Responsibilities: The Unique Experience of Students Who Are Family Caregivers.” AARP Research, 2020. https://www.aarp.org/content/
Gault, Barbara, Tessa Holtzman, and Lindsey Reichlin Cruse. “Understanding the Student Parent Experience: The Need for Improved Data Collection on Parent Status in Higher Education.” Briefing Paper C485. Washington, DC: Institute for Women’s Policy Research, September 2020. https://iwpr.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Understanding-the-Student-Parent-Experience_Final.pdf.
Garcia, Aileen S., Dan Wang, Michael Steven Williams, Jessica Payton, Sunah Hyun, and Minerva Tuliao. “Correlates of Well-Being and Academic Outcomes Among Student Parents in College During the COVID-19 Pandemic.” Journal of College Student Retention: Research, Theory & Practice 26, no. 4 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1177/15210251251321106.
Jain, K., K. Nikolajuk, J. Tully, J. Britten, T. K. DeClemente, and A. K. Johnson. “Title IX Experiences of Pregnant and Parenting Youth in Chicago: A Qualitative Study.” Journal of School Health 93 (2023): 289–96. https://doi.org/10.1111/josh.13272.
Manze, M., D. Watnick, and N. Freudenberg. “How Do Childcare and Pregnancy Affect the Academic Success of College Students?” Journal of American College Health 71, no. 2 (2021): 460–67. https://doi.org/10.1080/07448481.2021.1895174.
McNee, Emily. “Pregnancy Discrimination in Higher Education: Accommodating Student Pregnancy.” Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights and Social Justice 20 (2013): 63. https://larc.cardozo.yu.edu/cardozoersj/vol20/iss1/5.
McNeeley, M. E. “Title IX and Equal Educational Access for Pregnant and Parenting Girls.” Wisconsin Women’s Law Journal 22, no. 2 (2007): 267–88. https://wjlgs.law.wisc.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/1276/2015/06/mcneeley.pdf.
Mole, H. “A US Model for Inclusion of Disabled Students in Higher Education Settings: The Social Model of Disability and Universal Design.” Widening Participation and Lifelong Learning 14 no. 3 (2013): 62–86. https://doi.org/10.5456/WPLL.14.3.62.
Moss, R. A., J. Miller, A. Mohundro. “Our Hopes for Student-Caregivers.” About Campus: Enriching the Student Learning Experience, 30 no. 6 (2026): 17-22. https://doi.org/10.1177/10864822251378423.
Moss, R. A., J. Miller, A. Mohundro. “Lived Experiences of Student Caregivers.” National College Learning Centers Association Annual Conference. 2024.
National Center for Education Statistics. Postbaccalaureate Enrollment. Condition of Education. U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, 2022. Accessed June 16, 2023. https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator/chb.
Pew Charitable Trusts. “Economic Mobility Project Releases Comprehensive Study of Income Mobility in the U.S.” Press release, February 20, 2008. https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/about/news-room/press-releases-and-statements/2008/02/20/economic-mobility-project-releases-comprehensive-study-of-income-mobility-in-the-us.
The Pregnant Scholar. “Summary of Key Changes to the Title IX Regulations on Pregnancy and Parental Status: A Comparison of the 2024 and 2020 Rules with Best Practice Recommendations.” The Pregnant Scholar Initiative, The Center for WorkLife Law. 2025. https://thepregnantscholar.org/wp-content/uploads/Title-IX-2024-and-2020-Rule-comparison-with-best-practice-summary.pdf.
Tamborini, Christopher R., ChangHwan Kim, and Arthur Sakamoto. “Education and Lifetime Earnings in the United States.” Demography 52 no 4 (2015): 1383–1407. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13524-015-0407-0.
Understanding Student Parent Outcomes Act of 2025, H.R. 3994. 119th Cong. 2025. https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/3994/text.
Yates, A. S. Raising Expectations for Institutional Intervention: What Colleges and Universities Can Do to Support Student-Parent Success. Washington, DC: American Council on Education. 2024. https://www.acenet.edu/Documents/Raising-Expectations-Student-Parent-Success.pdf.
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