Higher education is essential to accessing high-demand jobs with family-supporting wages and improving family financial wellbeing. This was true before the COVID-19 pandemic and is especially true now as the nation continues the process of recovering from one of the worst public health, economic, and social crises in modern U.S. history. To achieve recovery goals, states will need to invest in systemic reform that aims to increase affordable postsecondary opportunities and better service provision for student parents across higher education and workforce sectors. This briefing paper provides insight into some of the policy actions states have taken, both prior to and during the pandemic, that could promote the systemic change needed to increase access to educational opportunities and improve outcomes for student parents. It focuses on three states--Georgia, Texas, and Washington--to describe new and existing policies that impact student parents' access to postsecondary opportunities and supports needed for pandemic recovery and long-run economic stability. This brief highlights how applying a student parent lens to policy and decision-making at the state level could benefit recovery among current and prospective student parent families, providing concrete examples from the three states examined. It aims to equip advocates and state policy leaders with information needed to design strategic investments that will promote parents' access to education, accelerate economic recovery, and improve the wellbeing of families. [This brief was written with support from Susana Contreras-Mendez.]