Summary

The Parent Worker Project empowers low-wage parent workers in Los Angeles to advocate for their children’s education. Funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, this program brings together workers, community organizations, schools, and policy stakeholders to promote the academic success of all students. The project’s first iteration successfully trained janitor parents, and the current initiative engages garment and domestic workers and their children in partnership with worker-led organizations: the Garment Worker Center(GWC) and IDEPSCA (Instituto de Educación Popular del Sur de California). While parents participate in a variety of adult education workshops, their children receive tutoring from UCLA students in the Learning Together! program, which was conceived, developed and put into practice by the UCLA Labor Center with tutor scholarships from the UCLA Center for Mexican Studies, the Institute for Mexicans Abroad, and the Parent Alliance.