Serving Homeless Children in Head Start
Melvin J. Gravely
CEO @ The Gravely Group | Public Administration, Leadership Development
Serving Homeless Children in Head Start
Children in temporary housing (often combined into one group using the catch-all term “homeless”) are one of the most difficult to serve populations for early childhood education programs.? According to a document by the New York State Technical and Education Assistance Center for Homeless Students (NYS-TEACHS), children in temporary housing are half as likely to participate in early childhood education than other children.
However, homelessness doesn’t always mean living “on the streets” in makeshift campsites or in a car, although that unfortunately does happen to many children and families.? The 1987 McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistant Act states that children are also considered homeless if they live in shelters, a hotel/motel, share housing with others such as family members or friends, or a combination of all of the above.
Since revisions to the Head Start Act in 2007, children who are homeless are automatically eligible for Head Start without income verification, and should be prioritized for enrollment [Sec. 640 (m)(1)]. With Head Start now requiring full enrollment of all designees, this is a good time to review your strategy for recruitment and enrollment for children in temporary housing.
This tip sheet from NYS-TEACHS is a short document and provides a good outline of the rules for recruiting children in temporary housing, as well as some tips on where you might get started in identifying families.? It includes:
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The final tip may be new to some programs. The National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth (NAEHCY) created a document titled “Reserving Slots in Head Start for Homeless Children.” It’s a good introduction to how programs might go about reserving slots for homeless children and utilizing Head Start’s rules that allows for an extra month to recruit homeless children.
First, it says that programs should decide how many slots to reserve BEFORE the school year starts (programs can reserve up to 3% of its slots). Then, it says that if a program is still underenrolled at the beginning of the year, it should consider using the additional month of time allowed by the Performance Standards to fill any vacancies first with children in temporary housing.? Then, if they cannot, they can take another 30 days to fill the slots based on their selection criteria.
Is your program actively recruiting children in temporary housing? Do you have any tips for other agencies that you’d like to share? Leave your comments below!
Chief Real Estate Officer at United Housing Connections
1 年Homelessness is such a huge barrier to so many other areas of needs for so many families experiencing this. For most, having somewhere to lay your head is at the top of the list next to food. Housing instability is a major barrier to adequate healthcare, food security and regular school attendance. Keeping families informed about the local resources available to them and educating them on homeless prevention is a first step. Collaboration with local housing providers, McKinney Vento homeless liaisons and community resource organizations is an important step in this direction to identify those families and surround them with these resources to help fill in these gaps and meet some of their needs.
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1 年These are very tough times for the parents of these vulnerable children. It is often hard for them to provide the necessary TLC to their little ones. This is a hard time for any parents and especially difficult for this group. It is a vital issue because a tough early childhood is now known to lead to later crime and violence and other terrible adult problems. Head start is a Godsend, but there is also a real need for parent support for these parents who do not have the resources to provide the consistent bonding and attachment their babies, toddlers, twos, and pre-schoolers desperately need. Highly regarded research describes the problem as not being able to give young children adequate nurturing love, guidance, support, protection and educational stimulation. Any ideas for helping this very vulnerable parent group right from the start? Many, not all, know what to do but cannot do it because of such difficult life circumstance.