Left out of the debate over how to fund Portland Public Schools (PPS) has been an entire group of vulnerable students: homeless children.
Recent studies by organizations such as the US Conference of Mayors – and confirmed by local tallies of people who are homeless in Portland – show that families with homeless children make up nearly half the homeless population. These numbers are reflected in our schools. A total of 1848 homeless students attended Portland public schools during the 2004-2005 school year.
Project Return, a federally funded PPS program, works diligently to help these students stay in school and succeed. Unfortunately, recent budget cuts cost Project Return nearly 70% of their funding. The money was used instead to run other programs. Volunteers and parents have sought to make up those cuts through private fund raising.
Almost everyone agrees that getting homeless students into public schools where they have the full range of educational opportunities as every other student is a key to their eventual success in life. Some communities, however, have sought to keep homeless students out of public schools over the years and set-up separate schools to serve homeless children. Separate, however, is never equal.
Federal law now states that the use of federal dollars on separate schools is illegal and advocates for the homeless – like the National Coalition for the Homeless and the National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth – believe that such schools violate the basic civil rights of homeless children. Separate schools do not offer the full range of services that public schools do. Bi-partisan leaders in Congress, education groups, and civil rights organizations all support making sure that homeless children have access to public schools.
Multnomah County, however, funds such a separate school instead of providing support for Project Return’s model of integrating homeless students into the public system. The Community Transitional School receives over $52,000 from Multnomah County each year. Students at this private facility are not subject to the same testing as public school students and the Multnomah County contract provides almost no real measurable outcomes for the program to achieve.
“We have learned over the years that model homeless education programs are those that keep children stable in their schools of origin, remove barriers to enrollment, attendance, and success, and afford homeless children and youth every opportunity to participate in school activities. We also have learned from those communities who had separate programs and then transitioned to an integrated model; these communities report being able to provide more comprehensive services to more children in an integrated setting,” says Barbara Duffield, public policy director for National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth.
No one is suggesting that the Community Transitional School and the people who support it through volunteer efforts and contributions are intentionally under serving the needs of homeless children. In fact, those volunteers should be applauded for trying to help a group of students many forget about. But their model for delivering services – putting homeless kids in a separate facility and away from other children – is outdated and flawed. Multnomah County’s support for this program makes no sense. The $52,000 being spent could go along way toward helping Project Return’s efforts to integrate homeless kids into the public schools succeed. We do not fund separate schools based on race or gender. Why do our elected leaders in Multnomah County believe homeless children should be served separately from other students?
Portland Public Schools serve fewer than 50,000 students each year and nearly 2,000 of those students are homeless. Those numbers should shock us all. But have you heard anything about the needs of homeless kids in public schools as the debates have raged this winter and spring how to best fund schools and which schools to close? Homeless children do not have a lot of allies in their corner.
Mayor Tom Potter and the Portland Public Schools – along with the newly elected leadership of Multnomah County - should call together a summit of stake holders on this issue after the May elections to develop a coordinated and integrated plan that has three primary goals: educating homeless children to the best of our ability, ending the duplication of services now created by Multnomah County’s support for a separate school, and providing new leadership and energy around the issue of ending family homelessness in our community. Homeless kids in Portland deserve the same as housed kids - our very best.
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Download Project Return's 2005 report.pdf
Download the Multnomah County contract with the Community Transitional School.pdf
Related Link: The 100 Most Frequently Asked Questions on the Education Rights of Children and Youth in Homeless Situations
