Since January 2008, 30 percent of the single parents who have joined the nonprofit Santa Clarita Valley-based Single Mothers Outreach support organization have also enrolled in college or trade school.

By purchasing refurbished laptops from TechSoup for $368 and selling them back to students for $150, Single Mothers Outreach has provided three College of the Canyons students and 143 parents total with laptop computers.

Single Mothers Outreach, founded in 1995 as a support and resource for single mothers struggling through the effects of divorce or the death of a spouse, became a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization in May 1998. Since then, more than 1,600 families have been served.