The Associated Students Inc. Finance and Budget Committee met at the University Union Tuesday to review grant applications made last semester about the College Assistance Migrant Program.

The College Assistance Migrant Program is intended to help students from migrant or farmer lifestyles transition to college in their first year.

“What some of these students do is actually go out to different schools throughout the community and help students figure out how to apply for college and get them prepared,” ASI Chair Alyssa Goularte said.

A supplementary grant will be allocated to the College Assistance Migrant Program to further assist students eligible for services under the program.

“With $10,000, (the program) will add more student assistant positions,” Goularte said.

The grant coming from the program serves students with jobs and increases their retention rate.

”Their retention for freshman year is higher for most other programs on campus,” ASI Director of Finance Mark Montalvo. “Despite the fact that a lot of them are coming from disadvantages.”

Currently, the program has allocated $30,000 from ASI to assist 88 incoming freshman and 326 ongoing students from migrant or farmer families with finding jobs on campus and other services.

”The outreach for recruiting is only one aspect,” said ASI Executive Director Patricia Worley. “The majority is providing mentoring, tutoring and additional sources of support to first-year students.”

The College Assistance Migrant Program received a high rating in its performance as an established program since its inception in 2008.

“They have been here for five years and continue to do a good job on what they’re set out to do,” Goularte said.

The program continues to grow each year, adding more students to its web of services, including six students who are currently employed under the College Assistance Migrant Program.

“The primary source of funding for the CAMP program is a federally funded grant,” Worley said. “They are in the final of their three-year grant period.”

The College Assistance Migrant Program was created to only assist a small demographic of students that come from that migrant background. The program has more of a focus on incoming freshman, but continues to help ongoing students as well.

“The eligibility criteria is specific that the students must be from a family of migrant workers,” Worley said.