Meet Jimmy Oates, a military vet and early childhood student

'If it wasn't for her, I probably would've just given up.'

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We’re on the road visiting all 58 community colleges, and we’re asking about early childhood preparation and the child care needs of students and communities. I was at Fayetteville Technical Community College last week. A highlight was talking with Jimmy Oates, above, about his journey to studying early childhood education.

For three years after Oates retired from the Army, he worked with 16-to-18-year-olds in hard circumstances. He also helped out at his cousin’s child care center and with his nieces and nephews.

He saw bits of his own story in the children in his life. When Oates was 4 years old, his mother died. He came across many children struggling in one-parent households, particularly fatherless boys, and thought he could play a role in a majority-female workforce.

“Not to be able to receive the motherly love, I think this is what has really drawn me to kids,” he told me.

It’s mutual. Oates described how children gravitate toward him — how the children in his cousin’s center and at the elementary school where he volunteers get excited when “Mr. Jimmy” visits and the infants raise their hands for him to hold them. “I’m really drawn to kids, and they’re drawn to me.”

Oates isn’t sure where he’ll end up after he finishes his associate degree. But he is sure that he wouldn’t be so close to the finish line — 39 credits in — without early childhood instructor Karly Walker (also pictured above, in the middle).

“If it wasn’t for her, I probably would’ve just given up,” Oates said. Walker is asking Oates to start mentoring another male student in the program. For now, he’s applying his learning to the many children in his life, like how to check in on children’s emotions and incorporate a struggling child into a group.

“I went through it too, so I know,” he said.

Below, don’t miss a Q&A from Katie Dukes with Jennifer Lansford, the new director of the Center for Child & Family Policy at Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy. Dukes asks Lansford what kinds of policy priorities the center has in the coming years to support children and families.

See you on the road!