Telegraph, 4 October 2003

They don’t appear on official statistics but, as Carl Wilkinson discovers, there are more parents around campus than ever before

“The day starts pretty early,” says David Kraft, a second-year law and languages undergraduate at Liverpool University.

By the time the average hungover student has rolled out of bed and staggered to the first lecture of the day, Kraft will have fed, washed and dressed his four-year-old daughter, Skye, taken her to her nursery and then installed himself in the university library. His student life can be pretty demanding.

Kraft is in a tiny minority, often unseen by the mass of carefree students. He’s a student parent. The number of students with children in Britain is difficult to judge because the data is not recorded. But student parents are on the increase as the number of university applicants rises.

As well as young parents making the choice to study, a NUS survey has suggested that one in 10 female students becomes pregnant during her time at university, underlining that student parents are a growing minority in all parts of the student community.

This year’s intake is probably the most diverse ever to have gone to university, and institutions are slowly wising up. “The whole education system is trying to get away from the traditional model of the 18-year-old undergraduate arriving fresh from home,” says Verity Coyle, vice-president, welfare, for the NUS.

“Unions are moving away from the more traditional pub crawls to include picnics and trips to fun parks.”

Tutors and lecturers are more accepting of students with young children and many universities now offer day-nursery and creche facilities. It’s a far cry from the days when having a child would have cut short a student’s university career.

When, at just 23, David was given custody of Skye, he had to grow up fast. “My life wasn’t going anywhere and I was hit by this realisation that as a single parent on benefits I was probably destined for a life of misery and poverty.”

He took an access to higher education course and moved from Southport to housing association accommodation in Toxteth, Liverpool. “I wasn’t planning on becoming a father and the whole experience made me look hard at my life and make a radical change.”

This term David, who is now 26, is moving to Germany for a year as part of his course. He’s determined to go and is taking Skye with him. “It is complicated, but it can be done. The main strain is that I won’t have my support network of friends while we’re over there.”

The usual university route - school and A-levels followed by a three-year degree course with a job at the end and family a distant speck on the horizon - is something Kraft and many like him will never know. For them university is a very difficult means to an end.

“I live a very frugal life. I fix things rather than replace them and I wear shabby clothes,” says Kraft, who receives a normal student loan, a dependents’ grant of £2,225 and a childcare grant that covers 85 per cent of costs such as nursery bills.

Last year he worked part-time as a community psychiatric nurse. “The only way I can survive is by borrowing and getting into debt. I will always see that Skye’s basic needs are met, though.”

At Durham University, Debra Metcalfe has also been struggling to come to terms with being a student parent. She is 30 and has a three-year-old daughter, Daisy.

After leaving school at 16 she worked as a booker for the Storm model agency in London, followed by a stint teaching in Dubai. “Going to university with a child seemed a mad idea,” she says. “The first term was probably the most difficult time of my life.”

While most students find their first terms stressful enough in terms of making new friends, living away from home and coping with the work, a student with a child has additional stresses to contend with. “Most students who go to university with children are a bit older,” says Metcalfe. “It’s very rare that there is an 18-year-old with a child because you generally can’t do it.”

Metcalfe also found the dual experience of being a single mother and a student dispiriting. “As a student you lose all the credibility that society affords you when you’re working. When you’re a single mum as well, people treat you differently - you’re scum. You have to stand up for yourself.”

The spontaneity of a night out is non-existent when you have a child, so it’s very easy to become isolated from the main student body. Kraft tackled the problem by getting involved with student committees and the Law Society.

Socialising may not be completely out of the equation then, but getting drunk - or even pulling an all-nighter when there’s a deadline - is another matter.

“Being hit on the head by a three-year-old with a plastic hammer while throwing up in a bucket is not much fun,” says Metcalfe, “so I don’t tend to drink much.”

It’s impossible not to admire the willpower of these two students and those like them. University is a matter of survival and for many the light at the end of the tunnel is still a long way off. But the result - a degree and a solid group of friends - is priceless.

For David Kraft, as he gets Skye up each morning, the positives are all that matter. “I’ve met the kind of intelligent stimulating friends I always wanted to meet, I have greater choices and opportunities open to me and Skye, and I’ve even been awarded prizes for my work. The future is definitely not doom and gloom.”