California schools see big jump in number of homeless students

California’s escalating cost of living has led to a 48% surge in the state’s homeless student population over the past decade, according to new research released today by researchers at UCLA. Almost 270,000 students in K-12 schools lacked stable housing in 2018-19, numbers that almost certainly have grown since the pandemic and economic downturn began last spring, researchers said.

“We knew the numbers would be up, but we were surprised at the scope and severity of the crisis,” said Joseph Bishop, director of UCLA’s Center for the Transformation of Schools, which compiled the report. “Looking at these numbers was really a ‘wow’ moment.”

Disproportionate numbers of California’s homeless students were Latino and Black: 70% and 9%, respectively. Latinos make up 55% of the overall student enrollment, and Black students 5.3% The federal McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act requires that every public school count the number of students who are living on the street, in shelters, in motels, in cars, doubled-up with other families or moving between friends and relatives’ homes.

Using data collected by the California Department of Education, the UCLA researchers interviewed more than 150 teachers, students, school administrators and advocates to get a fuller picture of who’s homeless, […]

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