Raelynn Villarreal
In the television show, The Parkers, both a mother and daughter attend community college together.
Some people think that it is a made-up story line, when in reality we have our own mother and daughter pair that both attend Pierce College and are very active in the American Sign Language program.
Pierce has a nationally recognized high quality ASL program which is one of the reasons why both mother and daughter decided to attend.
Most students wouldn’t think in a million years to attend school with either one of their parents, but that is definitely not that case for this close-knit mother and daughter.
Joni Sander, 49 and her daughter Kacie Sander, 21, have an extremely good relationship with each other and find it great to be attending school together. Despite their age gap, both mother and daughter enjoy sharing the same interest.
Since grade 9, Kacie has attended the ASL program at Pierce. She wanted to study ASL for her foreign language requirement to attend California State University, Channel Islands, where she now also attends.
Mother, Joni, attended Pierce for three years after high school.
“At that time, I couldn’t fit ASL into my schedule. After becoming disabled, I wanted to try to go back to school and I decided to see if I could learn ASL,” Joni said. “Kacie Jean encouraged me to give it a try.”
With the interest encouraged by her daughter, Joni thought it would be a great idea to start taking classes again.
So far they have taken ASL 4, and Creative Signing together at Pierce and also took another class over summer break in Washington D.C with their friends who are in the interpreting program at Pierce.
“I love attending college with my daughter. It has been a wonderful experience. I don’t have to be involved in everything she does, but it is nice to share this,” Joni said.
“It is nice for me because I have such a good relationship with my mother and taking classes together means we have time to spend with each other built into our extremely busy schedules,” Kacie said.
“When we’ve taken classes together, she always makes it clear that I can do whatever I want as far as whether or not we’ll sit together, or be in the same group for a group project.” Kacie said.
Going to school with your parent or child can have its benefits, but also it’s draw backs.
“Some of my friends don’t understand why I would want to take a class with my mom, but I think that is because they don’t have the same kind of relationship with their mom as I have with mine,” Kacie said.
One benefit would be having a study buddy down the hall to ask questions to and a person to split a parking pass with.
“We carpool, use one parking sticker, only need one parking spot (save space), and have made wonderful friends together,” Joni said.
They are very good at communicating with each other and rarely have communication issues that are common among parents and college students.
“Most people could never imagine taking classes with their children, some would never want to, but if you have the opportunity, I highly recommend it,” Joni said. “You will be amazed at what they know, and you will be able to see things from a completely different perspective.”
When they are not attending class, they both enjoy attending church at least twice a week where Joni volunteers with their college group.
Joni also enjoys sewing and is very crafty, but above all loves planting flowers in her garden.
Kacie Jean enjoys softball, scrapbooking and of course spending time with her family and friends.
As for future goals, Joni plans to get her Associate degree in ASL Interpreting, and then attend California State University, Northridge to finish her bachelor’s degree in Deaf Studies.
And for Kacie Jean, who will be graduating in the spring from CSU Channel Islands, she plans to attain her teaching credential and teach math either for high school or junior high.