New , released today by nonprofit Advocates for Children of New York revealed around 27,000 more students experienced homelessness than in 2022-23 for a total of 146,000 children. Roughly one in eight children lacked a permanent place to call home.

An influx of and a have likely contributed to the stark increase, experts said, outside of persistent drivers like the city’s . 

The 23% increase after a decade of mostly under 10% increases has alarmed education and housing advocates who called for the city, state and department of education to address shortages, , expand , improve the , and prioritize placing students into housing nearest to their school. 

According to the latest demographic data of students in temporary housing available from the 2022-23 school year, one in three were English language learners and nearly all were Black or Latino. 

This marks the ninth consecutive year student homelessness has exceeded 100,000. The latest tally of students could fill all seats in Yankee Stadium nearly three times over. Each of the city’s 32 school districts saw increases, but students experiencing homelessness were most highly concentrated in the south Bronx, upper Manhattan, and central Brooklyn’s Brownsville and Bushwick, where the city’s largest shelters are.

“The challenges remain stubbornly persistent,” said Jennifer Pringle, director of AFC’s Learners in Temporary Housing Project. “…If we’re [going to] talk about ending family homelessness, we need to make sure that education is front and center. Young adults who don’t have a high school diploma are four to five times more likely to experience homelessness as adults. We have to make sure that our young people right now in shelter are getting the support that they need, so they graduate and flourish beyond high school.”

The numbers, while unsurprising to experts familiar with the growing crisis, are likely still an undercount as to how many children are experiencing homelessness. Data capture only school-aged children, but “the most common age that someone is in shelter is under the age of 5,” said Henry Love, vice president of public policy and strategy with Women in Need, the city and nation’s largest shelter provider. 

“We’re probably talking about a quarter of a million or 200,000 children, at least,” Love said, emphasizing families are the main population in shelters today. “I’m still wrapping my mind around it.”

He added that the situation has been exacerbated by Mayor Eric Adams’ vetoing a package of the City Councils’ housing bills, which would have expanded financial assistance to families at risk of homelessness. After the Council attempted to override the vetoes, a . The decision is now being appealed in court, leaving thousands of families in limbo. 

“The number one thing is if we could keep people in their homes,” he said. “…We have decided by de facto that instead of giving these kids housing that they deserve, we said, you know what, we’ll give you shelter instead.”

Just over half of last year’s students who lived in temporary housing were “doubled-up,” sharing homes with friends or family, and more than 60,000 spent nights in the city’s shelters.

Data obtained from the state’s department of education also revealed alarming education outcomes for students in temporary housing in the 2022-23 school year, the latest available: on state reading and writing tests, proficiency for third through eighth graders was 20 points lower on average; and the high school dropout rate was three times higher than that of their peers. 

Students in shelter experienced the most negative educational impacts, seeing rates of chronic absenteeism closer to 70%, in part due to the city’s common practice of initially , adding strain to already costly and lengthy transportation routes. 

About 18% of students in shelters had to move schools at least once during the school year, four times the rate for permanently housed students. 

“It’s not good for students, it’s not good for the school to have that level of churn among your student population. You think about the connections that kids have to their peers, their teachers and how vital those relationships are and how much they can help a student during a time of housing instability,” AFC’s Pringle said. “Yet for so many families, they’re forced to contend between these ridiculously long commutes or transferring schools.” 

Mayor Adams’ administration also enacted an “inhumane” 60-day stay limit on particular shelters, disproportionately impacting the .

In addition to housing policy reforms, adjusting the state’s per-pupil formula would be critical in boosting kids’ educational outcomes by allowing schools to adequately invest in family outreach, attendance improvement, wrap around services with local community organizations, and academic tutoring. 

In a statement, Department of Education spokesperson Chyann Tull said the system has provided “field support, enrollment support, transportation services for students and parents, access to counseling, immunization assistance, and academic support.” 

The city has a goal of placing 85% of students in the same borough as their school, but “they haven’t gotten anywhere close to that .. more needs to be done there,” Pringle added. “I think it’s recognized by the fact that they set a goal that they are not achieving – they know that they need to do better.”

Alaska school districts risk losing access to up to several hundred thousand dollars in federal funding aimed at homeless students if they aren’t able to commit to spending it by the end of September.

The was included in a federal law providing pandemic relief, and national advocates have been pushing for Congress to extend the deadline, as it became clear that money could go unspent.

The exact amount Alaska districts could lose isn’t clear. Alaska districts have spent nearly 70% of their $2.3 million boost, leaving more than $700,000 unspent, according to the . The Department of Education and Early Childhood did not respond to a request for the most up-to-date figure or whether districts are on-track to spend down the balances.

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U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, worked on an amendment to the 2021 American Rescue Plan that secured $800 million nationally for students experiencing homelessness nationwide. Alaska districts received about eight times their usual annual funding.

The National Conference of State Legislatures called on Congress to extend the timeline to spend the money, under the terms of a longstanding federal law, known as the , aimed at ensuring homeless children’s access to schooling.

Barbara Duffield, the executive director of the national advocacy group SchoolHouse Connection, said the NCSL’s resolution is significant, even if it is likely too late for an extension from Congress.

“The window for that extension, sadly, has gone,” Duffield said. “Not for a valiant and a smart and a popular fight, but because of all these other dysfunctions in Congress.”

She said the resolution did more than ask for an extension; it showed the importance of the funding across states and territories.

“It puts a body of state legislators on record as saying we should have had more time. And moving forward, there needs to be more of a priority in investing in this population,” Duffield said.

The most recent state data shows that , and that the number has risen over the last several years. Most of those students live with another family, but about a fifth live in shelters and 10% are unsheltered.

Increased funding and programs typically leads districts to identify more students who are homeless, according to SchoolHouse Connection’s research. That data shows that the actual number of students that are homeless is typically 50-100% more than the official school count.

School districts in Anchorage and Kenai used the money to bring on additional staff to work with unhoused students. The Child in Transition Program in the Anchorage School District used its additional funding to hire two full-time staff for remote sites and five part-time staff in high schools that are there to support students on campus and connect them to services. David Mayo-Kiely runs the program, which has operated since the 1990s and has 10 staff members.

“They check in on attendance, they check in on grades. They’re just sort of there to be another ally for these students, someone they can go to,” he said.

Those roles are important because of how homelessness can negatively affect students at school. Students who are homeless are chronically absent at roughly the rate of their housed peers, which is known to be detrimental to academic performance. They are also nearly 30% less likely to graduate than their housed peers,.

ASD’s program also spent money on internet hot spots for students, professional development for the staff, and supplies. Mayo-Kiely said the district will leave only a very small amount of money unspent.

“The funding has been wonderful for us,” he said. “We were interested in having an extended funding, but we had been planning the entire time that this funding would be expiring by the end of this calendar year.”

And he said the funding will have a lasting effect, even though it expires at the end of the year: The investment in staff demonstrated how important those on-campus “allies” were for students, so now the district is using money from other grant programs to continue funding them.

The that urged Congress to extend the deadline was a priority of Sen. Löki Tobin, D-Anchorage and chair of the Senate Education Committee, after the Alaska Legislature failed to pass a similar resolution drafted by her office. Tobin is a member of the NCSL Education Standing Committee.

“Our hope with this resolution is to say, ‘Could we continue to use McKinley-Vento funds in this manner — hiring additional support personnel to provide wraparound services for the entire family?’ and also for us to think about how we might be able to reserve some of the remaining funds to continue serving students into the FY25-26 school year,” she said.

The funding that came with the pandemic boost also has more flexible spending rules that mean districts can spend it on student transportation to the same school, even if the student’s address changes — such as if they move in with a friend’s family or begin living in a shelter. Districts can waive certain enrollment requirements temporarily to make sure the student starts on time, and even help with school supplies.

“We have a significant increase in youth experiencing homelessness that has persisted, and we know that it’s not going to be an easy fix,” Tobin said. “Particularly with the lack of affordable housing in the Anchorage bowl, with some of the instability and low wages in some of those entry and mid-level positions. So we’re really anticipating that this population is going to continue to need additional resources and attention.”

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Kamryn, 18, who graduates next month from Hamilton High School in Culver City and will attend college in the fall, is one of about 15,000 homeless students enrolled in Los Angeles Unified schools — a figure that has continued to increase in the last three years after a lull during the pandemic.  

“I tell myself it’s just temporary, even though it’s been going on for a while,” said Kamryn of living in the car. “When I’m at school, I do my best to try to not think about it.”

Homelessness is a worsening problem for Los Angeles students, like , superintendent Alberto Carvalho said, which the district is struggling to address — and the official tally of declared homeless kids in the district, “is but the tip of the iceberg.”   

To address the worsening crisis, Carvalho said the school system needs more help from other city agencies and nonprofits. 

“The solutions for students experiencing homelessness cannot be solely the responsibility of the school district,” said Carvalho at a ceremony last week to honor graduating seniors who are homeless. 

“It needs to be a community-based approach,” he said, with a “greater level of collaboration between local social agencies, city and county government alongside the school district.”  

The number of homeless kids in LA schools is growing, Carvalho said. In the 2022-23 school year, LAUSD reported 9,140 homeless students, . 

It’s the district’s first increase in homeless students since 2019, when the total increased from 18,000 to 19,000; and then fell to 7,910 in 2021 with the implementation of citywide eviction protections during the pandemic. Those protections expired in February.

The true number of homeless students is much higher than the official figure, he said, because often students do not identify themselves as homeless. 

“There’s often shame,” said Carvalho, who experienced homelessness as a teen growing up in Miami. “You’re in a condition that you never thought you’d be in.”

The district is struggling with the surge, he said, because identifying homeless kids is difficult, and because city agencies don’t always collaborate on services for those kids.    

Homeless teens are among the city’s most fragile students. They’re less likely to graduate on time, and more likely to suffer from trauma and mental illness. 

Kamryn and her mother slid into homelessness this year after being evicted from their apartment in December, the girl said. 

The pair stayed with Kamryn’s brother for a few weeks, but since January have been sleeping in their car, parking the vehicle each night beneath a tree at a city park, putting up visors against the windows for privacy. 

Also participating in last week’s graduation ceremony was Janai Johnson, who in June will graduate from James Monroe High School. Janai has been homeless for most of her life and is currently living in a shelter with her mother. 

“I wasn’t always sure where our next school would be,” said Janai. Stress from constantly moving made it hard to study and get enough sleep before class, she said. 

Janai said homelessness “beats you down. But it’s not the things you go through – it’s how you react to those things.”  

Janai said a counselor at her school helped her succeed by connecting her with a therapist and getting her school supplies. She will attend Cal State Channel Islands next year, and major in child development.   

But kids like Kamryn and Janai are outliers. Homeless kids are far more likely to be chronically absent from school, and more likely to struggle academically and emotionally, Carvalho said.   

To support those students, Carvalho said, LAUSD has an Homeless Education Office that provides training for school staff and direct support to students, such as access to social workers. 

The district has also expanded its community school programs that offer added counseling and tutoring services to students, as well as access to campus-based food pantries and laundry services. 

And in March, for homeless families in the San Fernando Valley. The development, created through a partnership between the district, and , took five years to complete. 

Carvalho said the district hopes to create more housing for homeless families in the future, and that such projects shouldn’t take so long to complete. “I’m very concerned,” said Carvalho of homeless students. “They’re really facing extreme conditions.” 

The number of students in Washington’s school system experiencing homelessness climbed last year, a new report finds.

Data from the shows that 3.8%, or 42,436 students, experienced homelessness during the 2022-2023 school year.

That’s up from around 37,000 students during the 2021-2022 school year and roughly 32,000 students the year prior – though the report notes that remote learning policies during the COVID-19 pandemic made it difficult to identify and serve these students during those years.

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The increase could reflect both an overall rise in homelessness and school districts’ improvements in tracking these students, according to a spokesperson at OSPI’s Education of Homeless Children and Youth program. Access to more federal funding during the pandemic made it easier for districts to identify and work with students who are homeless.

Identifying students can help districts best serve them in what the report found to be one of the most stable and supportive places for those experiencing housing instability.

“Schools are a safe place for kids,” spokesperson Katy Payne said. “It’s consistent, it’s reliable.”

Federal law requires all school districts to annually report the number of enrolled students experiencing homelessness. Nationally, there are 1.2 million homeless youth in public schools.

In Washington, 9% of all students who identify as Gender X – meaning they do not identify as male or female –  are experiencing homelessness. That’s compared to 3.9% of all female students and 3.7% of all male students.

Nearly 12% of Native Hawaiian and other Pacific Islander students and more than 7% of American Indian/Alaskan Native students are homeless.

More than 87% of unaccompanied youth, those who are not in the physical custody of a legal parent or guardian, are as well.

The majority of students experiencing homelessness – 76% – share housing with other people due to loss of housing or economic hardship. More than 10% live in shelters, and another 6% live in hotels or motels. Almost 7% are considered unsheltered, living in cars, parks, campgrounds or abandoned buildings.

Students who are homeless often suffer academically and are more likely to drop out of school or get suspended or expelled than their peers. They also tend to have higher absentee rates, worse test scores and lower graduation rates, according to the report.

Payne said some of these poorer outcomes have shown signs of improvement. “Part of that is because districts have a better understanding and more awareness about what they’re responsible for providing for students,” she said.

Although the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction administers state and federal grants to schools, it’s up to local districts to determine how to coordinate services, like free meals or special funding and programs for low-income or homeless students.

One option is to fund a who works with students to ensure they stay on track toward graduation and participate in extracurricular activities.

Many districts used pandemic-era federal grants to pay for these liaisons and training to help teachers spot students who might not have stable housing.

As that money runs out, it could be up to the state Legislature or Congress to find other ways to fund similar initiatives, according to OSPI.

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Washington State Standard maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Bill Lucia for questions: info@washingtonstatestandard.com. Follow Washington State Standard on and .

It took five years for the project to be completed — a timeline that did not go unmentioned by representatives of the organizations involved.  

“Once we know better, we need to do better,” said LAUSD superintendent Alberto Carvalho. “And this time we need to do better and faster. Sun King is evidence that the impossible can be turned into the inevitable.” 

Carvalho called the partnership “a first of its kind, a difficult partnership. We have learned, and that learning should result in more projects delivered in a shorter period of time.”

Sun King Apartments, located in the San Fernando Valley just half a mile from Fernangeles Elementary School, was created through a partnership between LAUSD, and .

Services for homeless families have become more important than ever as LA Unified reported a in student homelessness from the previous school year. As of 2023–2024, there were 15,000 students reported homeless in the district. 

“It was around 2019…when Many Mansions approached us,” said Celina Alvarez, executive director at Housing Works. “There’s so many hoops and hurdles and paperwork and financing and service provision…it takes quite a while.”

Alvarez said the increase in homelessness is due to two things: rent increases and inadequate trauma services. 

“People are getting displaced rapidly and in high numbers,” said Alvarez, “A lot of children are coming from households where parents don’t have the knowledge or resources readily available to understand what their rights are in terms of tenant rights.”

The new apartments were especially good news for Annika, a homeless mother who has been living in unstable conditions for years with her daughter Faith and partner, Angel.

“The years of being homeless moving from couches to park benches to shelters have caused a decline in our emotional, mental, and spiritual health,” said Annika. “Knowing that we will have a permanent home, we were able to start thinking about what the future truly holds for us.”

The housing complex includes gated parking, an outdoor area and kitchen, a laundry room, and a community garden.  The complex will also have direct services for students such as tutoring, school supplies, summer classes and family gatherings.

This is not the first time LAUSD has partnered with developers to provide housing to teachers and students. In 2017, Los Angeles Unified partnered with , using vacant land just north of Gardena High School Campus to build Sage Park Apartments, a 90-unit complex.

Combined with a lack of mental health services for young people living in poverty it is difficult for students to get the help they need. 

“There’s people with a lot of unresolved trauma, untreated mental illness. And sometimes they’re coping with illicit substances because they’re easier to access than mental health treatment, ” said Alvarez.

For 24/7 mental health support in English or Spanish, call the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s at 800-662-4357. You can also reach a trained crisis counselor through the by calling or texting 988.

LUFKIN — Georgia DeVries misses sleeping in a car.

“It was safer than any house I’ve been in,” the 17-year-old said.

By her count, she’s lived in at least 13 different places since the sixth grade, including multiple homes with her mom, extended stays with friends and family, and four trips to behavioral health clinics.

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Then last November, after staying with her aunt, she ended up in her now ex-boyfriend’s broken-down Mitsubishi parked on his family’s property.

It wasn’t much, but she felt at peace — most of the time.

This is how many teenagers in rural Texas experience homelessness: a revolving door of sheltered and unsheltered living, friends’ couches, stints with extended family, nights spent outdoors. Homeless shelters are not an option in Lufkin, a town of 34,000, 90 miles south of Tyler, the nearest major city. Shelters here don’t take unaccompanied minors without reports of violent abuse.

A dearth of shelters is just one way homeless teens in rural areas are at a more significant disadvantage than their urban peers, experts say. A lack of good-paying jobs, poverty and drug abuse can be more common.

Poverty rose in between 2018 and 2022; a majority of those counties are considered rural. East Texas had a higher rate of opioid abuse than the rest of the state, according to a regional needs assessment based on data from 2018 to 2020. Texas, as a whole, was one of eight states where rural communities suffered higher drug overdose rates compared to their urban counterparts, according to a 2022 published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health.

And teens in rural areas are harder to track, making it more difficult for policymakers to design solutions based on quality data.

More than U.S. residents in 2023 were counted as homeless, according to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. . The statistic is based on an annual census of homeless people on a single night in January.

Rural and nonrural communities have similar rates of youth homelessness, according to a 2021 study by the University of Chicago’s Chapin Hall, a think tank focused on public policy that supports families.

But these annual counts — which Chapin Hall’s research is based on — face criticism across the board as they struggle to measure homelessness accurately, even in urban areas.

Erin Carreon, a researcher at the University of Chicago, said there is likely a significant undercount in rural areas. That’s because rural teens are often “hidden” from counters.

Georgia, for example, was with her then-girlfriend during the 2023 count, escaping the census.

“When we think of homelessness, we might think of people in shelters or we might think of people on a busy street corner that people are walking by,” Carreon said. “In a rural area, young people are more likely to stay on couches, inside vehicles if they are outdoors, and it might be in a more secluded and hidden spot.”

Six years ago, Georgia was living with her grandma and legal guardian, Jan DeVries. That’s when Georgia’s mother asked her to move to Beaumont, a much larger city about 100 miles southeast of Lufkin.

Georgia said she was excited. But after just one week at the new home, she clearly made a mistake. She left to move in with her girlfriend in Lufkin and stayed for two years.

A lack of early, stable relationships and a stubborn independence streak led Georgia to move in and out of homes frequently, DeVries said. In the years following the breakup, Georgia would stay with friends and family, sometimes lasting just one night.

Georgia acknowledges she has played a significant role in contributing to her homelessness. Her mental health is not the best, she said. She is seeking help and meets with a therapist weekly.

While DeVries has been one of the most stable forces in Georgia’s life, they’ve had their own falling out over Georgia’s sexual identity.

DeVries said she tried not to judge Georgia, who first came out as a lesbian when she was about 14 and then bisexual when she was older.

“I just didn’t like the fact that she was going to make her life that much more difficult for herself,” DeVries said.

LGBTQ+ youths were twice as likely to experience homelessness as their peers, according to another by Chapin Hall.

Georgia loved the company of little stray black cats that roamed the area near the broken-down car she called home last November. A stray dog would wander by occasionally, too, she said.

She is stick-thin. And she rocks a short, modern-day punk haircut dyed a mix of red, blue and green. Tattoos she did herself using a gun purchased online cover her body.

Like any teenager, she can be talkative at points or sit pensively, staring into space.

“I could have stayed there forever,” she said.

However, the freedom she felt came with some consequences. It was November, and the East Texas region was experiencing its first cold front. She posted videos on TikTok of her breaking down, crying about how lonely she was.

Her feet hurt from the cold. And once, she slept for nearly 48 hours straight fighting a urinary tract infection. A cousin later dragged her to the doctor’s office for help.

“There wasn’t a whole lot I could do about it,” DeVries said. “You pray real hard: ‘Protect her. Protect her. Protect her.’ Because she was out there and you can’t make her understand about the danger she’s putting herself in. It was misery.”

There wasn’t anywhere else for the teen to go in Angelina County. Local shelters only accept people over 18 unless violent abuse is reported.

Service providers don’t have an incentive to seek out these teens, because they have nothing to offer them. And public schools are supposed to act as a safety net, but students rarely know that, said Carreon, the University of Chicago researcher.

The Lufkin school district has a social worker. However, there’s little help for the kids who . And Georgia doesn’t remember the last time she was in a classroom.

Two adults who have tried to help Georgia are Pam and Yvonne Smith. They started the Kaleidoscope L.Y.F.E. Foundation to provide access to mentorship for at-risk youth.

Before launching the nonprofit, Pam Smith worked in the juvenile justice system and Yvonne worked at another youth advocacy center. For years, they watched the state and local foster care system struggle. Statewide, the system that is supposed to help young Texans find stable homes has faced scrutiny for staff , home placements and placing kids in hotels when foster homes were unavailable.

Local leaders and organizations, the Smiths say, have failed to close the gap.

“These kids are underage and can’t do anything for themselves,” Yvonne Smith said. “They’re stuck in a situation where they’re supposed to be an adult but are not legally able to act as one.”

They don’t receive support from the state, they can’t register themselves for school or GED programs, and they can’t sign a contract for an apartment or utilities, Yvonne Smith said.

Communities can begin to address homelessness by establishing strategies to divert teens from this path, according to Carreon. And she suggested that federal funding be made more broadly accessible to those communities.

Carreon thinks it really starts with schools, giving them the resources to identify these kids and provide them with help.

“Making sure schools have the capacity to fulfill their roles is really key,” she said.

Until that happens, rural teen homelessness will likely remain invisible and abstract.

Georgia had to move out of the car after it was vandalized.

And DeVries insisted Georgia return home before Christmas. She waits up each night for Georgia, who walks home from her job at Little Caesars. Georgia likes the work because she can munch on pizza during her breaks.

She puts aside as much money as she can for a car.

This article originally appeared in at .

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