Garcia has had many calls of the like recently. That's because, in his role at MSU, Garcia administers a longstanding federal initiative aimed at helping children of migrant families to attend American universities — one that has recently been put on the Trump Administration's federal budget chopping block.

Last week, the U.S. Department of Education informed Garcia that it would not be renewing the funds it has typically given to MSU to run the program for the 2025 fiscal year. 

Garcia told the mother that her daughter was secure at MSU, at least for the moment. The university has been expecting the Trump Administration to cut funding for CAMP, he said, so it preemptively reduced the number of students it admitted through the program this year and set aside enough of its own money to support them. 

What will the program look like next year, with federal support quickly drying up and MSU looking for its own 9% budget cut? Garcia doesn't know. 

"None of us do right now, because everybody's crunching numbers and looking at the resources that are at the institution," he said. 

Garcia and MSU students who receive funding through CAMP lament the peril the program is in, arguing it's an important mechanism to support a key constituency at the university. 

They're hopeful that the program will somehow be able to navigate through these financial burdens. MSU, however, has not given much assurance as to what the what the future of CAMP looks like — or if one even exists.

Spokesperson Amber McCann said that "There is no word on whether or not there will be an evaluation next year," in regard to if MSU will continue to financially support CAMP.

The 'tough part'

Funding for CAMP is disbursed in five-year cycles. The start of the federal government's next fiscal year on Oct. 1 would have marked the beginning of a new one. However, in the run-up to what would typically mark the funding renewal, the university wasn't hearing anything from the federal government. So MSU was forced to adjust. 

McCann said the federal government's funding for CAMP has historically covered the first year of university for undergraduates of migrant families. On top of that, the provost's office at MSU has chipped in extra money to support the students through their remaining undergraduate years up until graduation, she said. 

For this academic year, with looming uncertainty around federal funding, the provost's office allotted $190,000, which Garcia noted is half of the typical $425,000 the federal government has given per year to MSU to run the program.

McCann added that this contribution from the provost's office was an additional contribution beyond the funding they typically provide. Before the grant ended this summer, the Office of Undergraduate Education also made arrangements with CAMP to provide $225,000 of funding for this fiscal year. 

The university also preemptively admitted fewer students through CAMP this year, Garcia said. MSU typically enrolls between 50 and 60 students through CAMP annually; It brought in 30 this year. 

“It's a reduced amount, simply because it was a package that was put together internally to help us bridge the situation until we work out a bigger plan — that would get us more in line with where we need to be, to do the job that we have been doing,” Garcia said.

Discussions between CAMP and the university about the program's future — once the federal funding tap is turned off — are ongoing, Garcia said, with donor support being one proposal. MSU is also accepting donations on the Migrant Student Services website, he added.

While the future is unknown, Garcia said that completely dissolving the program is off the table, based on his conversations with MSU administrators. "Undoubtedly, everybody says, 'this is good,'" he added. "This is a very high, efficient, productive program. But now we just got to do the numbers. And that's the tougher part."

"Undergrad Education is now actively working with the Provost’s Office and the President’s Office to identify options for continuing CAMP with and without federal funding," McCann said. "This includes fundraising efforts, exploration of other grant opportunities and conversations with university leaders about other potential funding sources."

'It's a home'

As a graduate student around 15 years ago, Maria O’Connell worked as an intern for MSU CAMP, helping first-year students from migrant families get acquainted with university life. She grew passionate about the work and stayed on as a graduate assistant for the program after her internship ended. It was that experience that recently drew her back to work at the university, as a university innovation fellow and undergraduate student success strategic initiatives manager. 

"Oftentimes these students might be first generation college students," O'Connell said. "They might be bilingual students and multilingual students, and moving into that college experience can be really challenging. This program really helps to provide those supports, to help students have all the resources, all the tools necessary."

Cindy Villarreal is a history social studies secondary education senior and is attending MSU through CAMP. She's in its office nearly every day.

"It's a home, it's a family," Villarreal said. "It has spaces for us where we can just go in there, relax, do our homework, have someone to talk to have someone to hear us out."

Aside from money for tuition, MSU CAMP also hosts networking events, and will occasionally cover costs for expenses like a student's graduation cap and gown.

"If there's available funding, they might even buy us our books," she said.

Villarreal grew up the daughter of farm works, traveling to different states and, "following the agricultural seasons." Currently, her parents are working in Indiana. She said that the CAMP office gives her a space to talk about her issues with people who come from similar backgrounds and know what it's like to be a first-generation student.

Without CAMP at MSU, Villareal "doesn't even know what (the university) would look like." To lose it, she said, would be detrimental not just for herself, but to the university as a whole. Still, she believes the program will overcome its financial burdens. 

"I don't think that CAMP will cease to exist," she said. "I think that it has such a strong root inside of this university and so much support."