Located on the outskirts of Redwood City, just a short bus-ride from the public elementary and middle schools attended by our students, Cañada College, part of the California Community College system offers professional and academic degree programs together with generous financial aid packages.

Designated an "Hispanic Serving Institution" by the federal government (one of only two in the San Francisco Bay Area), Cañada serves about 6,000 students, of which 42 percent (about 2,500 students) are Latino.

Working closely with Cañada's Reference Librarian, David Patterson, (a former member of the Los Ayudantes Board), we hold day-long tours of the Cañada campus for our middle school students so as to demonstrate for them how close and accessible a college education can be. As part of these tours, our students observe students training for professional degrees in careers such as radiology and fashion design. And they hear presentations from Latino students from a wide array of educational and cultural backgrounds pursuing academic bachelor degrees through Cañada's University Center.

These trips to Cañada awaken our middle school students to the future educational possibilities immediately within their grasp, sparking their imaginations and helping them to believe that a college degree is realistic and desirable. We look forward to continuing to develop our relationship with Cañada in the coming year and in years to come.