Child Homelessness and Education in Philadelphia

Homelessness is a very big issue in the city of Philadelphia. There are so many children who are homeless and the people of Philadelphia do not even recognize it. They blend in with all of the other children because they are embarrassed. Children should never be in a position to be homeless. They deserve all of the same things of as a child who is not homeless.

The most important opportunity that all children should be afforded is a proper education. This is such a big issue. Often, homeless children do not have a mom or dad to go home to at night and do homework with or even a table to do their homework on. Furthermore, ever more sad is how the people of Philadelphia at times cannot tell who is a child that is homeless, because at times these

kids are basically undercover. It is important to remember that the youth is this country’s future.
According to the website www.projecthome.org, on a single night in philadelphia in 2015 “there were 36,907 unaccompanied homeless children and youth on a single night in 2015.” That is a very disgusting and upsetting thing, because no one could imagine how someone would handle themselves in that situation of one of those children. The city of Philadelphia received $31 million dollars for homeless programs. Unfortunately, the city only allocates about $1.1 million dollars of that amount specifically for youth homeless. The city should give the majority of that money to the city’s youth population, because they are the future. That money can be a huge help for our young population. That amount will not cover the 36,907 homeless children that are unaccompanied in the street of Philadelphia on a single night (www.projecthome.org). Young adults need money for a lot of things like a bed, so they can be comfortable when they are in the shelters without any parents. Education is another big thing that that money could spent on. How do they even have a chance to get on the right track as an adult when they will not have the knowledge to do anything. The city needs to implement more programs and create more resources to ensure this kids get was they deserve to be able to be an active member in society.They need more than only $1.1 million dollars to be able to accomplish these goals.
There are so many ways that youth become homeless. Most of the time it is not their fault. This world can be a tough place to live in especially, if there is nobody helping you and pushing you into the right direction in life. Things could be really bad at home for the young adults and nobody is there to help them. According to www.homelesshub.ca, “they could be dealing with physical, sexual, and emotional abuse.” Physical abuse is when they are being hit or things are being throw at them, it could get really bad. Sexual abuse is when they are forced to have sex with someone or gasped inappropriately anything that has to do with genitals or a female's “spot” and it is not consensual. Emotional abuse is when people say very hurtful things to another person. This can cause children to have very low self esteem. A parent could be an alcoholic or addicted to drugs and their anger or withdrawal could retaliate in name calling or body shaming. Another negative consequence that a child may have to deal with aside from abuse is bullying. Bullying happens anywhere you could think of. Some youth homeless may be getting bullied in more than one place. Some kids may be getting physically abused by someone at their house then when they go to school they are getting emotionally bullied by other youth children. Most of the time no adults know about anything that is going on because they are too scared to say anything. One of the biggest reason young adults get bullied is because of their sexuality. Gay, lesbians and transgender are often not accepted and find themselves having to run away from what should be their safe home. Reasearch from the website www.homelesshub.ca shows “the consistency about 20 to 30% of youth homeless are lesbian, bisexual or gay.” In today's world some people think being anyone of those three is a crime. A lot of family and/or friends will disown you if they know that you are an LGBTQ. According to an article on www.rollingstones.com, “about 40 percent of youth homeless is a result of family rejection.” The website goes on to explain that they may not accept the fact that their child is dating the same race. This will eventually also end up being tied back together as emotional bullying. Everyone is entitle to love who they want to love. With people discriminating against this issue this is hurting the youth children who are a part of the LGBTQ community. No one knows the pain they have going on inside from this.
Another really big issue young adults become homeless is poverty (www.homelesshub.ca). Poverty is the state of being poor. Poverty is the amount of money that the family is making to support each other. According to Merriam-webster.com, Poverty is simply being poor. Not all families can have expensive things, a big house, nice car or fancy clothes. Some families do not have enough money to eat everyday. The children could have the best support system at home, but poverty will eventually hurt them in every way possible. It is very hard to live in poverty. You need money for everything in this world.The average household budget recorded in 2013 was $63,784 according to www.valuepenguin.com and in 2014 the average expenses were $53,495 (www.bls.gov). The house that you live in , you need money to pay for that. The water you bathe in, yes, you need money for that. Also, the food that you eat, of course you need money for that. So nothing in this world is free. It can be very stressful lifestyle.
As a kid you want the most popular thing and the new game systems that everyone else in school is talking about and that is a very hurtful thing that your parents can't afford these things for you let alone to hope that they can afford the next meal. It could be very difficult thing for a young child to understand this type of lifestyle. There are these types of families all around you, and the crazy part about it is you cannot pick them out because the are undercover so they don't get picked on. Eventually living in poverty will get you kicked out your house and sometimes force families to break apart from each other. That is another way that children become homeless, it is when they enter foster homes or group homes (www.homelesshub.ca). There are so many ways a child could enter the foster care, there parent could have passed, they could have been given up at birth, etc. They are a big help to the youth but there is only a number of spots they have and it's definitely not enough. Sometimes the foster parents are not what they seem to be. There have been numbers of reasons kids end up moving from different homes to new ones. Some give up on troubled kids or are sexually, physically abusing them. Some runaways tie together with foster living for youths. Most of the time they only keep an adolescent until they turn 18 years of age. A question that always comes to mind is where do those children go when they turn eighteen years old? Most of them have noone to go to because their family members were separated, dead or honestly don’t want anything to do with them. Therefore, when they are forced out onto the streets at the age of eighteen they will be homeless once again. Foster homes and group homes are doing the best that they can do. But if the young adults do not get the correct education they need , when they age out of the foster home they won't have the knowledge to live on their own.
In addition, it may be too late for them to go back to school.

In today's world the jobs are limited everywhere and people who have college degrees are having a tough time finding a job. It will be very hard for them to get up on there feet and mature to a young man or a young woman. There are so many organizations out in this world to help youth homeless. For example, there is a non-profit organization called Stand Up For Kids. This organization is a really big help for those who are faced with the challenges of living on the streets. Their mission is to end the cycle of youth homeless throughout the united states. Stand Up For Kids was founded in 1990 by a group of volunteers in San Diego, California. The program wants to make kids who don't have families the urge to continue to fight and to learn life skills. The volunteers walk the streets to look for young homeless children and provide them with the things they need such as food, clothes, and other important necessities. The volunteers also teach the children how to talk and the proper way to communicate to another person. That is important because it will help them get a job or go back to school and get their GED. These volunteers are showing these children that even when times are tough there is always someone who cares for them and will be there with them whenever they need

them.
Another really great organization is Project Night Night. This organization donates over 25,000 “night night” packages a year. These packages may seem small but the meaning behind each item is huge. The package contains a new security blanket, an age appropriate children's book and a new stuffed animal (www.projectnightnight.org). These three items that are in basically comforting the child. The blanket is replacing the parents comfort, the book is giving the knowledge that the parents are supposed to be embracing the child and the stuffed animal is being there for them so the don't feel so alone. This organization helps reduce the trauma and the emotional cognitive of the child.
Lastly, there is an organization is called The Youth Emergency Service, also known as YES. YES was founded in 1976 and is one of the top organizations in Philadelphia. It works with kids 12 to 17 years old. These children can enter the organization through the Department of Human Services (DHS) or through the street outreach programs. This program can hold up to 400 homeless children at a time. Once these children are in this organization they get offered so many things. They get to have free medical health services. That is a very big deal. Some of these children have not been medically examined since they was a newborn. Another thing that they get offered is free HIV/AIDS testing. This is also very important for them because with them living on the streets before they got into this organization anything could have happened and these kids are exposed to many things. But the most important one of them all is supervised education and recreational programs. This is giving these children the knowledge that these children deserve! It is giving these children a fair opportunity to be successful in life. It is good that they are doing this because by the time they have to leave this YES organization they will be somewhat considered as a young adult and they will be ready to go off into college or start their life and get a job. This is very important and this program is definitely going into the right path.
Over the past couple of years the amount of youth homeless has gone up tremendously.

According to www.childtrends.org, “1.4 million student were homeless at the start of the 2013-2014 school year.” While this is more than twice as many as in school year 2004-05 (590,000), some of this increase may be due to improved reporting, as only 65 percent of school districts reported data in that year (compared to 99 percent in 2013-14) (www.childtrends.org). However, there is good reason to believe that at least some of the increase reflects real growth in this population; in school year 2007-08, with 91 percent of school districts reporting, there were only 795,000 students who were homeless. In school year 2013-14, the majority (75 percent) of homeless students were “doubling up” with other families. One-seventh (15 percent) were staying in shelters, six percent were in hotels or motels, and three percent were “unsheltered,” meaning that they were living outside, in abandoned buildings, in cars, or in other places not meant for human habitation. Sheltered homeless children are disproportionately young (www.childtrends.org). In 2013, fully 10 percent of homeless children who spent time in shelters were under the age of one, 39 percent between one and five, 33 percent between six and twelve, and 18 percent between 13 and 17. Among unaccompanied youth, as one would expect, a large majority (87 percent) were between the ages of 13 and 17. However, seven percent were between the ages of

6 and 12, and another five percent were younger than 6. Younger unaccompanied children are likely staying with In 2013, among unaccompanied youth in shelters, 54 percent were female.The Federal Strategic Plan to Prevent and End homelessness has set a goal to prevent and end homelessness for families, youth, and children by the year 2020. This needs to happen because these numbers are a complete disgrace. Pennsylvania is ranked number 8 on the list of states of child homelessness. This is terrible! According to a study conducted by the national center on family homelessness found that 1 in every 30 children are homeless. New jersey was in the top 10 in states that have homeless children and children who are at risk in becoming homeless. The national center on family homelessness calculates that 2.5 million American children were homeless at some point in 2013. The problem is particularly severe in California, which has one-eighth of the U.S. population but accounts for more than one-fifth of the homeless children with a tally of nearly 527,000. But with that being said Pennsylvania and New Jersey were among the best states addressing the issue.
Society today has set very high expectations on our nation’s youth. How can they meet those expectations with the obstacles that they have to face. Being on the streets makes it hard to achieve great things. It can affect the way their life plans out in the future and when they become an adult. Most colleges and universities offer in state tuition. In order to receive this tuition rate you must have a stable address or proof of a house that shows you live reside in that state. These young adults cannot get the in-state tuition rate and the price of college can end up being a lot higher. Temple University's in state tuition is $15,188 and their out of state tuition is $25,494. This is very expensive especially to these young adults who don’t have any money to live on a daily basis. The same idea applies for young adults to work. Young adults need an identification card to work, and no proof of residence makes it hard. They then can’t get a job to pay for a house; so how do they expect to pay for college as well? Some of these kids don’t even know if they are going to be able to eat throughout the day. It is as if they are set-up to fail and it is no wonder many of them turn to drugs. It is almost an escape from the world they can’t escape from.
Presently youth homelessness is a huge epidemic in our society. However, the city of Philadelphia is doing an outstanding job on addressing the issue. That it is not to say that there is so much more work that has to be done. There needs to be more programs and programs to have people actually build some life long relationships with these children. They should make a school just for those who are homeless. In that school everyone will feel at home, they will finally get that family that they always wanted and they will also be getting that education that they need to become successful when they grow up. For the young adults that are about to enter the adulthood, they should make a special trade school. This will allow them to learn a trade that they will be able to make a living off of in their life. These ideas will make Philadelphia one step ahead of the game. This will decrease the number of homeless in the future without a doubt.