Faced with low wages and unaffordable housing, people become homeless. Some have children. School districts find themselves struggling to accommodate students who are homeless. It’s a predictable problem, and it’s growing.
Many jurisdictions still favour a head-in-the-sand approach. There’s only a problem if you actually raise your heads, open your eyes, and take a look at the situation. And hey, you can still get away with doing nothing, if you decide the problem resides 100% with the parents, not the district.
But if you’re a community with a conscience, and have decided it’s a public responsibility to provide equality of opportunity for children, then you have to recognize that homelessness is a significant and growing problem.
Wisconsin has decided that all its communities owe a responsibility to all students, even those who are homeless. That puts the state, as well as its communities, in a useful position to report on the problem, a perspective that is needed everywhere homelessness is on the rise.
Read more in GazetteXtra: Homeless Students On The Rise Locally, Statewide
