Single Stop Provides Connection To Vital Resources That Help Students Succeed

As the Commuter reported in a Sep. 15, 2018 column, the Single Stop online site is a “service that streamlines resources available to students through a fast and easy online form based on your specific needs.”  

As well as updating the online search engine with local services like food banks and health programs and using funds to directly help students with one-time needs such as textbook rentals, Single Stop program coordinator Amanda Stanley works in partnerships with various campus departments and community programs to help students.  

For example, Stanley has set up a Health Navigator who is on campus Wednesdays 8:30 to noon in Takena to help students sign up for health care.  On Wednesday May 7th, student Yasmeen Gonzalez-Mendoza was getting help from the Health Navigator: Kelly Schell.

“Kelly Schell has made the process of getting OHP very easy and comfortable,” said Gonzalez-Mendoza, who is a graphic design major.  Gonzalez-Mendoza found that the Health Navigator was on the LBCC campus when she googled “OHP assistance Albany Salem.”

“In four mornings in November and October, 75 students were enrolled into free health care,” Stanley said in an interview in her office in Takena 112, referring to the Oregon Health Plan, which is a free and very effective health plan in Oregon that is open to students and citizens who are low-income.

Stanley’s regular emails and presentations to deans and faculty have been effective in building campus partnerships that help students.

For example, Automotive Technology Program faculty worked with Stanley and Single Stop to help some automotive students buy parts to fix their own cars.  In an emergency situation, Stanley partnered with staff in the Registrar and Business office to help a student pay one month’s rent.

And LBCC faculty Liz Pearce, who has had Stanley come speak in her classes, overheard a student say that she would have not been able to continue in school had it not been for the help she received from Single Stop.  

RJ Ellers and Dean Dowless in welding have also contacted Stanley to help students.  And Hollis Duncan in math faculty walks students over and connects them with Amanda. “I love it when faculty does that,” said Stanley.

Story by Karen Canan