When people think of the homeless, it’s usually of that guy at the street corner with a cardboard sign, or that guy sleeping on the park bench who “wastes” the money he gets.
If you look a little closer, you’ll find that many homeless people in Michigan are actually children attending school whose families just can’t make ends meet. Homeless students are students lacking a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence. In order to address and reduce student homelessness in Michigan, local schools should partner with their local communities to meet the additional needs of families struggling with homelessness.

Dante Walton, a Michigan student from Hillsdale High School, when interviewed about his experience with homelessness stated, “Attendance was good, got in trouble a lot. I did homework but I didn’t at the same time. My mom worked at goodwill for two years. It was pretty hard on me, seeing her struggle.”
In other words, he tried in school, but he couldn’t focus on it because he was more worried about his family and his situation. He would do homework, but would be distracted because of the fact that he was homeless and had no assurance that anything in his life was stable. It is important that we give students in Michigan the stability and assurance they need to focus and excel in school, so that their future can be brighter than their past.
Furthermore, according to a U of M news article by Jared Wadley, “Homeless students had the highest chronic absenteeism rate in the state at 40 percent” in the 2017-2017 school year.
This means that along with being homeless, these students are likely to miss a lot of instruction inside school as well. This puts the students themselves at risk of not growing up with the education they need to secure a favorable job and make a living. These children are missing their chance to get out of homelessness and become successful, and we need to help them have the ability and motivation to do so.
Additionally, according to a U of M study compiled by Jennifer Erb-Downward, “Homeless students have the highest high school dropout rate of any group in Michigan,” with one of five homeless students dropping out in the 2016-2017 school year.
This shows that these students are losing faith in their schools, and in their mentors who have failed to provide for them. This needs to be taken seriously because they have been so disappointed by their schools’ ability to help them, that they feel it would be better to drop out altogether. We need to give them a reason to stay; we need to show them that we can help, or they will keep leaving.
Unfortunately, schools alone can’t always help. According “A Snapshot of Homelessness and Housing Instability in Michigan Schools” by Jennifer Erb-Downward and Michael Evangelist, “Homelessness and housing instability impact educational outcomes in ways that schools are not always well equipped to address.
Developing partnerships to meet the additional support needs of children and families struggling with housing instability could help to fill these gaps.”
Schools can’t help homeless students get what they need alone; they need help. Schools need to partner with their local communities in order to reach out to the children whom the public school system can’t reach with what they have.
Homeless students need to be helped in order for schools to be the positive learning environment they were meant to be, not just to the students with homes, but to all.
School board members might argue that homeless students don’t need the money or support for housing and supplies in order to do well in school. However, they ignore the fact that homeless students have the lowest four-year graduation rate in Michigan with only 55% achieving it.
Kids and teens can’t achieve academic success until they are able to stop worrying about the ever present problems of being without a home. They are expected to achieve in school when they don’t even have an adequate home. They feel rejected and alone with no one who is helping. These students have no homes, no help, and no hope, and we are the only ones who can give that to them.
Clarkston Junior High 8th grade Honors ELA students wrote columns focused on increasing activism. The top six were submitted to The Clarkston News.