291 students are currently homeless in Berkeley Unified School District (BUSD). District McKinney-Vento Counselor Sophina Jones presented about the state of youth homelessness in Berkeley at a joint meeting of Berkeley City Council and the Board of Education on October 5.
The McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act requires school districts to accommodate children who lack a “fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence.” It provides funding and guidelines for the resources that homeless students should be offered.
BUSD is currently in year two of a three-year McKinney-Vento grant that provides $53,000 per year. This funding is used for tutoring and mentoring programs and computers for homeless students to use for schoolwork.
Jones said BUSD spends about $17,000 of additional federal education funds on school supplies and other homeless student needs.
In her presentation, Jones said there are 110 homeless students at Berkeley Technology Academy (BTA) and Berkeley High School (BHS), seventy in BUSD’s three middle schools, and 111 in elementary school. 187 are African-American, 49 are Latino or Hispanic, fifteen are white, and 66 identify as more than one race. 35 homeless students are English Learners and 83 have one or more disabilities.
Homelessness is not defined by a single living situation. Out of BUSD’s homeless families, thirty live in shelters, thirteen in hotels or motels, eight are unsheltered, and 231 live temporarily with other families. Around one hundred students sleep outside of Berkeley, resulting in a longer commute to school.
Jones said, “As a small school district, we try our best to support [homeless] students by giving them access to school enrollment without barriers, free and reduced lunch, as well as school supplies and access to during and after school activities.”
BUSD provides bus transportation for elementary school students, and public bus and BART passes as needed for older students. Jones does case management for students and their parents or guardians. She advocates for students around Individualized Education Programs, attendance, and discipline issues.
In addition, fourteen high school students receive mentoring through Berkeley Youth Alternatives, a local organization dedicated to mentoring youth and supporting them through social, emotional and economic issues.
Jones also arranges one-on-one tutoring with credentialed teachers. However, during her presentation, she mentioned challenges finding enough teachers and mentors to meet student needs.
Several other community organizations provide services to homeless BUSD students. Youth Spirit Artworks (YSA) is an art job training organization that pays stipends to BUSD students, some of them homeless or at risk of homelessness, for activities such as painting community murals and decorating clothing items. YSA participants also receive support on college applications and resumes and are placed in jobs and internships.
YSA Executive Director Sally Hindman said that during the first few years that money was available through the McKinney-Vento Act, numerous projects were carried out to help homeless people get off the street.
However, Hindman said that there has not been sufficient money available to assist homeless people through the act in nearly twenty years.
“You could say [McKinney-Vento] was a fantastic pilot program that desperately needed to be continued. And if it were fully funded, it had, and really still could have, the potential to hugely impact ending homelessness,” said Hindman.
Notwithstanding the specific amount of McKinney-Vento funding available to the district, Jones said the main obstacle for homeless students in BUSD is the lack of affordable housing for their families.
“Families are stressed out and have limited means. With rising cost of living and lack of income families are often living on top of each other,” she said, referring to families who live with friends or relatives because they don’t have their own housing.
Jones said that when asked, many housed families support homeless BUSD students, from providing school supplies to sponsoring students to attend prom. Jones said that homeless students appreciate this sort of community support and expressed hope that families would continue to sponsor students.
In order to support homeless students, Hindman said that Berkeley should provide more job training and casual job opportunities to subsidize their income. She advocated more health services and substance abuse recovery programs geared towards homeless youth.
She said, “I also find that more in the way of diverse mental health services are needed, like opportunities for long-term therapy. And dental care is nearly completely unavailable for homeless youth, so improved dental resources are badly needed.” Hindman also agreed with Jones’s assessment regarding the need for more affordable housing.
Through her October 5 presentation to the BUSD School Board and City Council, Jones hoped to bring more awareness to the approximately three hundred students in BUSD with unstable housing situations. Although she expects continued McKinney-Vento funding in the future, Jones said that there still is not enough being done at the moment.
Jones concluded, “Action needs to happen. The city government and BUSD need to collaborate about the epidemic of homelessness and the children who are suffering. We need housing, we need resources, and, above all, we need to be seen.”