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A staggering 8 percent of kids affected

Flat wages, skyrocketing rents force thousands more children into temporary housing
New York Teacher

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The terrible recession that hit New York City in 2007–08 was officially over in June 2009, but it was far from over for the city’s low-income families. Stagnant wages and soaring rents have forced thousands of children into homelessness in the years since 2008, with a devastating impact on their academic lives.

In 2008, just 1.1 percent of public school students were listed in temporary housing, a UFT analysis of Department of Education statistics shows. That counts children in shelters as well as children doubled up with family members or living in other temporary quarters. In 2009, that rate more than quadrupled, to 4.8 percent, as city families lost their apartments and more financially desperate immigrants arrived.

Since 2010, while landlords have enjoyed record rental prices, evictions have multiplied and the number of homeless students has continued to grow.

The New York-based Institute for Children, Poverty and Homelessness, in an August 2015 report, found a 25 percent increase in homelessness among the city’s public school students between 2010–11 and 2013–14, years that the city economy was supposedly recovering. There were 83,000 students in temporary housing by 2013–14 — a staggering 8 percent of the entire school population.

A new report from the city’s Independent Budget Office shows that the student homeless population in 2013–14 included 27,800 children in shelters and another 48,300 doubled up in relatives’ homes. Almost 7,000 children were “unsheltered,” meaning they lived in motels, cars or on the streets.

Children in “doubled-up” housing have accounted for much of the growth in homelessness, the IBO report shows. Doubling-up is more prevalent among immigrant Hispanic and Asian families, according to Raymond Domanico, the IBO’s director of education research, while African-American families are more likely to be in shelters. “There are only so many shelter beds to go around,” Domanico said.

Homelessness is not an equal-opportunity fate. Fifteen percent or more of public school children are homeless in District 5 in Harlem, Districts 9, 10 and 12 in the Bronx and Districts 16 and 23 in central Brooklyn, compared with less than 5 percent in wealthier neighborhoods in Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island, according to the Institute for Children. One out of four homeless students is an English language learner, although English language learners represent just 15 percent of city students overall.

Homelessness peaks in kindergarten and 1st grade, the IBO found. “Those initial years after having a child are generally times of great economic upheaval,” noted Giselle Routhier, the policy director of the Coalition for the Homeless, making parents of very young children especially vulnerable.

The coalition’s 2015 report found that one in 17 African-American children are homeless, compared with one in 34 Latinos and one in 368 whites.

The academic impacts are similarly disparate. Thirty-eight percent of homeless students were chronically absent, missing more than 20 days of school in 2013–14, according to the Institute for Children, far more than students in stable housing. Twenty percent dropped out (versus 9 percent in stable housing), and test scores and graduation rates were also much lower among homeless students. And despite the obvious challenges faced by students in temporary housing, the DOE’s budget formula does not allocate additional funding to schools that serve these students.

There may be a tiny ray of light. “We have started to see a slight decline in the past few months because of a number of programs the mayor has put in place,” said Routhier. But the de Blasio administration is fighting a powerful tide.