University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

Helping students find a way home: one case at a time

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Helping students find a way home: one case at a time

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Content HELPING STUDENTS FIND A WAY HOME: ONE CASE AT A TIME by Marissa Elizabeth Monroy ____________________________________________________________________ A Professional Project Presented to the FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree MASTER OF ARTS (BROADCAST JOURNALISM) May 2008 Copyright 2008 Marissa Elizabeth Monroy ii ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract...............................................................................................................................iii Article..................................................................................................................................1 Bibliography......................................................................................................................17 iii iii ABSTRACT: Never sure where they are going to spend the night or when their next meal is coming, school is usually the last thing on the minds of children who are homeless. It is the responsibility of homeless education counselors to help these children and their families cope with their daily struggles including housing, transportations and medical issues. But with the number of homeless students in the Los Angeles Unified School District swelling more than 35 percent in the past year to 13,521 students, the district and the mere five homeless education counselors assigned to these cases are struggling to keep up in assisting the homeless population in the nation’s second largest school district. 1 1 Stacks of bulging files are spread across old metal desks in the small portable building in downtown Los Angeles. With only a handful of employees actually occupying seats behind the desks, the office seems almost empty. The only sounds coming from the tight space is the occasional clicking of a computer keyboard and the dull hum of the air conditioner. It may not seem like the Los Angeles Unified School District's Homeless Education Program is bustling with activity, but that is only because the workers in this department spend almost all their time shuffling around town taking care of the district's nearly 14,000 homeless students. “I try to be everywhere there’s a homeless family in need, which usually means everywhere but here,” said Stephan Blustajn, an LAUSD homeless education counselor. “But, this is home base for us,” Blustajn said of the small crowded building on South San Julian Street. “It’s where we come together to brainstorm about how we’re going to tackle the myriad of problems and issues we face day to day.” The portable building is a tight fit, even for the small number of workers involved with the LAUSD’s Homeless Education Program. Desks are awkwardly close to each other with folders and files often falling over onto a neighboring table. There are a number of resource books unevenly stacked on top of a nearby bookcase that look as though they have been used on far too many occasions. Inspirational quotes like the Chinese proverb, “The journey is the reward,” dangle loosely from the walls. Blustajn said these sayings serve as a daily reminder to the counselors about the importance of their work. 2 2 The number of homeless students in the district has soared more than 35 percent in the past year to 13,521 students and this proliferation is increasingly straining resources in the nation's second-largest school district. Nowhere are the struggles more apparent than when homeless counselors gather in this office. The building serves as the administrative center for the homeless education counselors assigned to all the homeless students in the school district. “Unfortunately, there’s no instruction manual on how to do our jobs," Blustajn said. "We end up turning to each other constantly for help because believe me, we can use all the help we can get." Blustajn is hardly alone in his struggle to help homeless students. Across the country, homeless school counselors, or liaisons as they are sometimes referred to as, find themselves fighting an uphill battle everyday. Money is sparse, and coworkers to help with overwhelming caseloads are even harder to come by. In Los Angeles, five counselors split the almost 14,000 homeless students enrolled in area LAUSD schools, with one permanently stationed in the office. "Five of us for all those children may seem overwhelming, and it is, but when it comes down to it, we're actually pretty lucky," said Ana Quintero, another LAUSD homeless education counselor. Quintero and the other homeless education counselors feel they are fortunate because federal law entitles only one liaison per school district, not five, regardless of the size and needs of the district. "Of course it's not fair that tiny school districts in more economically advantaged areas are given the same number of counselors as districts as large as ours," Quintero 3 3 said. "But it's time we don't have to fight that battle; we're too busy working to do much about it.” LAUSD was not always so "lucky." It was not until last May that LAUSD hired an additional four counselors to ease the workload of the sole counselor on staff. The hiring was prompted by the 2005 Greater Los Angeles Count, a study that examined the homeless situation in Los Angeles. In the report, the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA) suggested the city's homeless youths are placed in an endless cycle of circumstances that critically impact their chances of escaping life on the streets. Los Angeles: Homeless capitol of America According to the report, there are about 88,300 homeless people living in Los Angeles County. No other city in the country even comes near that statistic, the closest being the five boroughs of New York with an estimated 48,000 homeless people. National trends indicate that more and more of this homeless population people are children. In Los Angeles alone, about 35,000 people in the total count are families. “It’s an epidemic that’s particularly evident here in this city,” Blustajn said. “Los Angeles is constantly featured on news shows or programs for our constant struggle with the issue of homelessness.” In recent years Los Angeles’ Skid Row has become the focus of many national stories, highlighting people who struggle not only with poverty, but also physical and mental illness and addiction. The area in downtown Los Angeles is home to one of the largest congregations of homeless people. But these struggles are not limited to this one area. Homelessness is an increasing problem in almost every section of the city and many point to a lack of affordable housing as the biggest hurdle. 4 4 "It's impossible," Quintero said of the scarcity of affordable housing. "The economic situation for these families makes it impossible for them to afford even deplorable housing." The logical answer would be to refer these families to shelters, but this type of housing does not always fit the mold of every family. Because of limited funding, each homeless shelter has its own set of restrictions in place. These limitations can include the number of children, their ages and even the sex of these young people. Rita Vendela and her 11-year-old son were turned away from numerous housing shelters. Having only one child that was under the age of 15, she fit the criteria for many of these places. But because she had a son, and not a daughter, she was turned away. "They were afraid my son was going to stir up trouble," Vendela said. "He had no history of messing things up, but because he's a male, they didn't want him anywhere near the little girls in the center." This is not an uncommon excuse. Housing shelters, like battered women's shelters, are often aimed at certain segments of the population. For instance, the single shelter in southeast Los Angeles only accepts single adults. It targets this demographic because the shelter’s programs are primarily aimed at adults with a history of alcohol abuse. "It's particularly sad when these places force families to split apart," Quintero said. Many times, homeless shelters will not take in a two-parent family. "When this happens, the father is forced to take the son to one place while the mother and her daughter go and live somewhere else." 5 5 Sometimes, even fitting a shelter’s criteria is not enough. While Vendela and her son have made some progress locating shelters that fit their family mold, they have been relegated to a waiting list because of overcrowding issues. "With my luck, my son will be told he's old enough to live on his own when they finally decide to call my name off that list," Vendela said. "Who cares about me, but what about my son?” There is little homeless counselors can do to help alleviate this problem on behalf of people like the Vendela family. Counselors can make calls and pay visits to different housing communities on behalf of families, but they have no sway in terms of finding shelters. Identifying the unidentified Indeed, most affected by this lifestyle are the people less visible to the public eye. Often flying under the radar, homeless children are a major concern, especially with regards to education. The number of homeless students in the district is alarming, and yet officials with the LAUSD Homeless Education Program are quick to warn the problem may be much worse. "Many parents and students don't want to report being homeless," said Melissa Schoonmaker, pupil services and attendance coordinator for LAUSD's homeless education and teen parent programs. "Being homeless is a stigma that many of our families will do what they can to avoid." Schoonmaker oversees the homeless counselors and acts as a liaison between all the counselors and school officials. She believes this mentality of embarrassment can make it difficult to keep count of the number of homeless students. 6 6 "You know kids aren't like homeless adults," Schoonmaker said. "You don't necessarily see them begging for money at the corner street or holding up cardboard signs asking for help." Still, part of a homeless education counselor's job is to make sure homeless students are counted. Under federal law, any child who has no permanent address is considered homeless, including those in doubled-up housing living with a relative or friend or families in temporary placements arranged through the state Department of Social Services. “When family members are kicked out of their house or apartment, a lot of times they are forced to move in with family members,” Schoonmaker said. “They may have a roof over their head, but that doesn’t mean they don’t require our help and attention.” More and more, homeless students are expanding the very definition of what it means to be homeless. Determining which students are homeless was once a relatively straightforward assessment for alert educators. Now officials have to probe deeper for answers to questions about a child’s lifestyle. “We’re also talking about kids who run away from abuse or whose parents kicked them out,” Schoonmaker said. “A lot of these kids stay quiet out of fear, which makes our job to help them difficult.” Recognizing homeless students is not easy, particular in a district with close to 700,000 students, but homeless counselors emphasize the need to identify these students in order to provide various resources. The homeless education unit relies heavily on schools to direct children to their department so that they can be identified and then helped. 7 7 Supply and demand Counselors work closely with district teachers who believe their students are eligible for the program. Once a student is connected to the counselor, program officials assess the case and then make sure children are given the appropriate supplies for the child’s educational needs. "These resources can pretty much translate to anything and everything you can possibly imagine," Quintero said. "Transportation, books, showers, food, health records - you name it, we have to find a way to provide it." The counselors often collaborate with community service agencies in an effort to give students as close to a normal life as possible. This can mean providing basic school supplies like pencils and erasers or outfitting kids from head to toe. “You might call the stuff we give out 'used,'" Quintero said. “None of it is 'used' though; the items are all ‘gently loved' and will continue to be loved by the kids and families they are passed onto." The Homeless Education Program sponsors several open houses throughout the year where community organizations can stop by and see what services they can offer. At one recent open house, even some local doctors attended to extend assistance to the program. “A lot of times doctors will offer free eye or dental exams,” Blustajn said. “A visit with a doctor - it’s an all new experience for a lot of the children, a much needed experience.” Providing medical, dental and mental health referrals is a major undertaking for the counselors, particularly because homeless students are much more prone to health 8 8 problems. According to the National Center on Homelessness and Poverty, homeless children suffer from physical problems almost three times as much as other children. Officials believe health issues only increase in severity as children get older. “Because of their age, homeless youth have few legal means by which they can earn enough money to meet basic needs,” said Jan Moore, a program specialist with the National Center for Homeless Education. “Many homeless adolescents think the only way they can survive on the streets is by exchanging sex and drugs for food, clothing and shelter.” Moore has devoted her career to helping homeless children. She said homeless children have so many issues to be concerned with that a clean bill of health usually is relegated to the bottom of a long list of concerns. In the past 15 years, she has witnessed many legislative changes in educating homeless children, but she said one thing has remained the same. “Schools hate having to deal with homeless children,” Moore said. Access denied "Some school officials think they can skirt around the law by not allowing homeless children to attend school because they don't have the proper records," Blustajn said. "As a homeless counselor, it's our job to make sure these children are enrolled in school regardless of missing papers like their shot records." There have been numerous occasions where Blustajn and Quintero have had to stop by an LAUSD school and argue with school personnel ranging from secretaries to principals about the rules that govern homeless children. And even that does not work sometimes. 9 9 “There are people at some schools who refuse to listen to us. It doesn’t matter that we are district employees,” Quintero said. “We have no choice to report them to the state if this happens.” Denying enrollment to any student in this country is illegal, even students lacking required documents such as proof of residency or immunization papers. This is true even if the family or the student is an undocumented immigrant. "It's not up to us or the schools to refuse education to anyone," Blustajn said. "That's someone else's job." However, counselors are responsible for helping families get these required documents in order, which is where voluntary doctor visits or referrals come in handy. By teaming up with the homeless education programs, medical professionals make it easier and more accessible for poor families to seek medical treatment. Other guests one might not expect to see at these open houses are lawyers. Stacy Anthony serves as a deputy city attorney and assesses the effectiveness of the counselors’ impact on the children. “I’m here to try to get to the bottom of this problem,” Anthony said. “We want to find out where we can help and take legislative action if organizations designated to helping homeless children aren’t carrying out their responsibility.” Anthony works closely with the department to ensure that funding is being allocated to the right divisions. “In downtown, for example, many of the homeless children need just that – a home,” Anthony said. “But in the South, we allocate more money toward activities that get the children off the streets and away from trouble.” 10 10 Anthony explained that it is more expensive to afford housing in Downtown Los Angeles than compared to other parts of the sprawling Los Angeles metropolis. Conversely, issues like crime tend to plague homeless children in the Southland more often. “As you can see, we get a lot of people in here trying to help us in a lot of different ways,” Blustajn said. “Goes to show you how many hurdles these homeless families have to overcome.” Community programs and officials may help supply many of the student’s needs, but it is up to the counselors to make sure these various services and materials are distributed. "People always want to give us money, but because we're a school and basically non-profit, we can't take any of it," Quintero said. "But give us all the supplies you want to give us; we'll take it." What the law says The LASUD Homeless Education Program was designed to provide assistance to homeless students and their families in compliance with the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act. Congress first authorized the act in 1987; President Bush strengthened the law in January 2002 when it was incorporated into the No Child Left Behind Act. “When the mandate was reauthorized, there were a number of new rules that educators weren’t exactly aware of,” said Melissa Schoonmaker, who is charge of keeping the LAUSD counselors up to speed with changes in the law. "These mandates ranged from the schools students are placed in to new transportation rules." 11 11 Prior to 2002, most homeless students attended school closest or most convenient to where they were sheltered. As families picked up and moved from place to place, many of these students also transferred from school to school. “It was hard keeping track of the children when they switched schools so often,” Ana Quintero said of one of her tasks as a homeless counselor. “You’d finally find them some sort of stable environment, and then, before you knew it, the family was forced to relocate.” Within a year, 41 percent of homeless children will attend two schools and 28 percent of homeless children will attend three or more different schools. Homeless advocates and educators argue that frequent displacement hurts students academically and psychologically and pushed for policy changes when it came time to reauthorize the provisions of the law. Jodi Mincemoyer, the communications director for the National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth, estimated that with each school change, a student is set back academically an average of four to six months. "Students benefit from constancy," Mincemoyer said. "Staying put means they are less likely to fall behind in their school work, repeat a grade or drop out of school." "Familiarity also helps the children when they aren't changing up teachers, friends and activities," Mincemoyer added. Now, the law authorizes homeless education counselors to make whatever adjustments necessary to limit or prevent these children from transferring schools. Allowing children to stay at what policy makers designate as "schools of origin" may benefit the students, but it is a difficult policy for counselors to follow. 12 12 School districts must provide or arrange transportation for students who want to stay at their schools of origin, even if students move to a different city, county or school district. For LAUSD's homeless counselors, that means handing out bus tokens to families throughout the city. "Sometimes, with these tokens, I feel like I'm at a parade handing out candy," Quintero said. LAUSD's policy of having a parent ride with children under the age of 12 is one of the most important transportation rules, but many times it is also one of the most difficult to impose. "Many of our parents have work schedules that don't necessarily allow them to take their kid to work Monday through Friday," Blustajn said. "They beg me to let them off the hook, but we just can't be held liable." Another problem homeless counselors often encounter is children arriving late to school. “Just because we now have this law, it doesn’t always mean it’s what is best for the child,” Quintero said. “If they are not fully accessing their educational opportunities, well then maybe they should attend school a little closer to home.” This school year, LAUSD has provided transportation to almost half of the families involved with the program. Transportation expenses are one of the bigger budget items on a list already packed with requests for needed resources. 13 13 Fighting the funding war LAUSD counselors like Blustajn and Quintero are constantly worried about a lack of funding, and with good reason. In 2007, the federal government cut 11 percent of the funding allocated to the U.S. Department of Education for homeless education programs. “Less money means less grants awarded for less school districts,” said Karen Lints, an associate government program analyst with the Education for Homeless Children and Youth Program for the state of California. Lints determines which school districts will receive grant money to help offset the costs of their program. Grants for homeless education programs are handed out every three years with current grants set to expire in 2009. “This year we had to cut back on the amount of money we were handing out,” Lints said. “We promised them a set amount of money, but with the cuts, we had no choice but to pull back.” Not every school district in the state applies for the money, but those that do, are in an aggressive funding race. On top of taking care of the homeless population in schools, it is also up to the counselors to apply for these grants. Analysts, like Lints, with the Education for Homeless Children and Youth Program in Sacramento, California, determine not only which school districts will receive federal money, but how much funding the district will receive. Worth noting is that the size of the school district’s homeless population has no bearing on the amount of funding it may receive. Instead, the state’s program bases their decision on how well school districts address their needs with programs and activities. 14 14 “Without a doubt, applying for these grants is a cumbersome, competitive process,” Lints said. In the latest round of funding, only 80 out of 115 applicants received desired funding. Both the Los Angeles County Office of Education and LAUSD received grants for the current three-year cycle totaling $305,000. However, the Los Angeles County Office of Education must also share the awarded grant money with other school districts in the county, including regions such as Long Beach and the Norwalk-LaMiranda school district. “It’s a constant battle to get money,” Quintero said of her additional role as a homeless counselor. “We know when we’re at the losing end of that battle, it’s time for us to get creative.” While some other school districts in the country have enough money to transport students in private shuttles, LAUSD officials tight budget forced the counselors to limit their transportation expenses. Forced to be resourceful, counselors circumvented this problem by handing out bus tokens instead. But now counselors are worried that more budget cuts will again force them to go back to the drawing board. Despite significant increases in the number of homeless children, federal funding has been reduced. In 2007, $7.7 million was distributed in aid money to California. That’s down from the $8.3 million handed out the year before. Lints expects funding to level off for the 2008 fiscal year, but she said that even if that is the case, programs are still forced to work with less money for an ever-expanding problem. 15 15 “Lack of funding means that many homeless students are not receiving all of the services they need to participate and achieve in school,” Quintero said. “This compromises their future success.” Educators and homeless advocates agree that education is a way out of homelessness. Taking advantage “We urge the children and their families to take advantage of our services,” Blustajn said of the LAUSD homeless education program. “It’s their path to freedom, a way of escaping the life they live right now.” Blustajn believes that one of the biggest goals of the program is getting the word out about their services. “A lot of parents have no idea that we offer these kinds of services,” Blustajn said. “It’s hard to make a difference when parents don’t know programs like this exist.” Adriana Blackwell agrees. This MTA bus driver and her six children lived in her van for years. Earning $2,000 a month put her over the $1,200 income limit to qualify for welfare, but her salary was not enough to make the deposit on a housing arrangement. "Being a bus driver made things a whole lot easier," Blackwell said. "I'd shuttle all my kids to school in the bus and then start my route and be on my merry way." During the summers, Blackwell said her children would stay on the bus throughout her entire shift. This situation continued until Blackwell became involved in a bus accident. "My bosses were not at all happy with me," Blackwell said. "Even after I told them I had no other choice, they couldn't see that I was left no options." 16 16 Blackwell was unable to work due to injuries she sustained in the accident, but was still getting paid. One day while waiting after school to pick up one of her children, Blackwell noticed the LAUSD homeless program was hosting an information session later that afternoon. "I figured this show couldn't hurt," Blackwell said. By the end of the week, LAUSD counselors referred Blackwell to several affordable housing options and when a contract fell through, Blackwell and her six children jumped at the chance for a stable living situation. Now Blackwell said that all of her children are excelling and becoming more active in after-school activities. The U.S. Department of Education estimates that in 2000, 87 percent of homeless children were enrolled in school, with 77 percent attending regularly. That is an increase from just 65 percent of students attending school ten years earlier. “Relief mostly, that’s what I feel now that I have things under control,” Blackwell said. Despite already being overwhelmed, officials with the homeless education program hope that families will continue to become more aware of this sort of help. "These children don't have a stable place, a place to call home, but they certainly have the right to an education," Blustajn said. “You need to remember that these children didn’t create the situation they are in, so they need to be helped even if the community or the family around this is not cooperating.” “Parents are really grateful for what we do here,” Quintero said. “They call us angels, but I tell them it’s just my job.” 17 17 BIBLIOGRAPHY Anthony, Stacey. Personal Interview. 7 November 2007. Blackwell, Adriana. Personal Interview. 7 November 2007. Blustajn, Stephan. Personal Interview. 7 November 2007. Coalition for the Homeless. "Reforming New York City's Rent Subsidy for Homeless Families." 10 January 2008. <http://www.coalitonforthehmeless.org/advocacy/HomelssRentSubsidy>. Lints, Karen. Phone Interview. 2 February 2008. Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority. "2005 Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count." 25 October 2007. <http://www.lahsa.org/2005homelesscount.asp>. Mincemoyer, Jodi. Phone Interview. 20 November 2007. Moore, Jan. Phone Interview. 20 November 2007. National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty. "NLCHP Programs and Successes." 22 October 2006. <http://www.nlchp.org/MISC/Marketing_Sheet_Final.pdf>. Quintero, Ana. Personal Interview. 7 November 2007. Schoonmaker, Melissa. Personal Interview. 7 November 2007. U.S. Department of Education. "Fiscal Year 2001-2009 State Tables for the U.S. Department of Education." 1 February 2007. <http://www.ed.gov/about/overview/budget/statetables/index.html>. Vendela, Rita. Personal Interview. 7 November 2007.

Abstract (if available)

Abstract Never sure where they are going to spend the night or when their next meal is coming, school is usually the last thing on the minds of children who are homeless. It is the responsibility of homeless education counselors to help these children and their families cope with their daily struggles including housing, transportations and medical issues. But with the number of homeless students in the Los Angeles Unified School District swelling more than 35 percent in the past year to 13,521 students, the district and the mere five homeless education counselors assigned to these cases are struggling to keep up in assisting the homeless population in the nation 's second largest school district.

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Asset Metadata

Creator Monroy, Marissa Elizabeth (author)

Core Title Helping students find a way home: one case at a time

School Annenberg School for Communication

Degree Master of Arts

Degree Program Journalism (Broadcast Journalism)

Publication Date 04/24/2010

Defense Date 04/23/2008

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag education,homeless counselors,OAI-PMH Harvest

Place Name Los Angeles County (city or populated place)

Language English

Advisor Celis, William, III (committee chair), Hentschke, Guilbert C. (committee member), Nelson, Bryce (committee member)

Creator Email mmonroy@usc.edu

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-m1187

Unique identifier UC1281916

Identifier etd-Monroy-20080424 (filename),usctheses-m40 (legacy collection record id),usctheses-c127-59441 (legacy record id),usctheses-m1187 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-Monroy-20080424.pdf

Dmrecord 59441

Document Type Project

Rights Monroy, Marissa Elizabeth

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Repository Name Libraries, University of Southern California

Repository Location Los Angeles, California

Repository Email cisadmin@lib.usc.edu