Thank you to all who attended the conference!

Summary

With the goal of better serving Chicago’s homeless student population, over 150 educators and social service providers attended Supporting Homeless Students: Sharing resources and Promising Practices, a conference hosted by Chicago HOPES.

HOPES worked with its conference partners, Beacon Therapeutic and Heartland Health Outreach, to identify issues of particular importance to the audience they planned to reach. Presentations ranged from investigation into the policies behind how homeless students are served to presentations by those people that work with homeless students on a daily basis.

Educators speak about school resources

Dr. Carole Lang and Annie Pugh, the principal and clerk of McCutcheon Elementary School, spoke passionately about the 92 homeless students their school educates.

“We will never turn any student away because they don’t have the resources – we’ll create the resources,” said Lang.

In addition to the federally mandated rights of transportation, school uniforms and fee waivers, McCutcheon has also provided other services. Pugh noticed that students were often coming to school with dirty uniforms so they invested in a washer and dryer.

Susan Reyna-Guerrero brought the diverse crowd together with an overview of homelessness in Chicago Public Schools, the issues homeless students in CPS face, and the resources in place to support them.

Research results

Dr. Martie Wynne of Loyola University in Chicago presented data from on-going research on McKinney-Vento, the law that governs the rights of homeless students.  After nearly nine months of interviewing homeless families living in three Chicago shelters, Wynne and her team have discovered several successes and weaknesses in the policy and its implementation.

In addition, attendees were presented with an overview of the Homeless Emergency Assistance and Rapid Transition to Housing (HEARTH) Act by Nicole Amling from the Chicago Alliance to End Homelessness. The HEARTH Act opens the door to opportunities for the segment of our homeless student population in “doubled-up” situations.

Resource fair

Attendees did more than listen to speakers all day. During a long lunch, resource providers were invited to host tables and share information on their services with their colleagues and educators.

Attendees were also treated to a presentation of footage from The List, an upcoming and surprising documentary about youth homelessness in Chicago from Spargel Productions. Anne de Mare, co-director of The List, spoke to the audience about her experience in creating the film. Following the footage, she joined a panel discussion on youth homelessness featuring Melissa McGuire from the Night Ministry, Patricia Rivera from Chicago HOPES and other conference presenters.

Working together

At the end of the day, Tremel Daniel from Chicago Public Schools Students in Temporary Living Situations Program (STLS) brought home the point that we all need to work together to serve the holistic needs of homeless students. While it is good for each of us to excel in our individual capacities, we make a huge difference in the lives of our students through collaboration. Attendees left the conference with a better understanding of the needs of Chicago’s homeless students and what they can do to ensure the equal educational opportunities of that population.