The American Almanac of Family Homelessness: A Tool to Evaluate How Effective Your State or Community is in Identifying Homeless Students Matt Adams Institute for Children, Poverty, and Homelessness NAEHCY 27 th Annual Conference November 15, 2015, Phoenix, AZ

Overview Part of 2015 American Almanac of Family Homelessness, released in October Developed 5 indicators to measure homeless children of all ages access to education Ranked states as an example to highlight important differences Indicators can be used as a tool within states to measure performance at district, school, or program levels

Goals for this morning Learn how to evaluate access to education in your community –Understand what data to use and how to use it Discover how your state is doing Pending federal legislation Discuss and offer feedback

Agenda Presentation –Math is fun! –National year-by-year results –State-by-state results for Small groups Ask questions as we go!

Key concepts Homeless children are under identified and disconnected from services Counterintuitive: higher numbers aren’t necessarily bad Can’t compare total numbers since states aren’t the same size Don’t know how many homeless children there are

5 indicators 1.Percentage of children in Early Head Start & Head Start who are homeless 2.Homeless children as a percentage of poor children in pre-kindergarten 3.Homeless children as a percentage of extremely poor children in grades K–12 4.Number of school-aged children living doubled up for every school-aged child staying in a shelter 5.Percentage of unaccompanied homeless FAFSA applicants verified as homeless

Early Head Start (EHS) & Head Start (HS) Problem: don’t know how many young homeless children there are (left circle) Solution: overlap of 2 circles ÷ right circle Indicator 1: Percentage of children in EHS & HS who are homeless All young homeless children All children in EHS & HS Goal: enroll all age-eligible homeless children –overlap of 2 circles ÷ left circle = ideal –Percentage of young homeless children in EHS & HS

U.S. 4.6% #1: MT 12.0% #50: MS 0.9%

Prekindergarten (pre-K) Problem: same Solution: overlap of 2 circles ÷ inner right circle (the green one) Indicator 2: Homeless children as a percentage of poor children in pre-K Poor is better to use than all All homeless children ages 3 to 5, not K Poor children in pre-K All children in pre-K Goal: same

U.S. 3.9% #1: WI 17.3% #50: WY 0.0%

Grades K–12, Part 1 Problem: same Solution: inner circle ÷ outer circle Indicator 3: Homeless children as a percentage of extremely poor children in grades K–12 All homeless children in K–12 Extremely poor children in K–12 (50% poverty level) Homeless children identified in K–12 Goal: identify all homeless children in grades K–12 –Want inner two circles to match –inner circle ÷ middle circle = ideal

U.S. 27.1% #1: AK 69.4% #50: RI 8.1%

Grades K–12, Part 2 Problem: don’t know how many are doubled up Solution: left circle ÷ right circle Indicator 4: Number of school-aged children living doubled up for every school-aged child staying in a shelter All K-12 identified as doubled up All K-12 identified in shelter ÷ Goal: same as K–12, part 1

U.S. 4.9 #1: MS 22.2 #50: MA 1.4

College Goal: improve access to and services in college Problem: no data exists on number of homeless youth attending college or want to attend Solution: use available data to address 1 known issue Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) –Requires parents financial information –Not for unaccompanied homeless youth (UY) if verified by one of 4 approved authorities

FAFSA 96% all FAFSA applications accepted in % for unaccompanied homeless youth (UY) 95% for UY if verified by: –McKinney-Vento Act school district homeless liaison –U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) homeless assistance program director –Runaway and Homeless Youth Act (RHYA) program director 6% of UY applications accepted by college financial aid administrators

FAFSA Problem: none Solution: ideal Indicator 5: Percentage of unaccompanied homeless FAFSA applicants verified as homeless All UY applying for FAFSA All UY applying for FAFSA verified as homeless Goal: verify all unaccompanied homeless youth (UY) applications –inner circle ÷ outer circle = ideal

Percentage of unaccompanied homeless FAFSA applicants verified as homeless (by application cycle)

Percentage of unaccompanied homeless FAFSA applicants verified as homeless U.S. 47.3% #1: ME 67.9% #50: CA 32.3%

#1-5: AK, OR, CO, ID, WI #46-50: NJ, PA, RI, CT, HI

43 states responded to an informal survey 40 have ability to track homeless graduation rates Only 9 currently do and 5 report publicly High School Graduation Rates

Small Group Discussion How could you use this? Who has the data? What other data is available in your community? How could the state rankings be better? For reference: 1.Percentage of children in EHS/HS who are homeless 2.Homeless as a percentage of poor in pre-K 3.Homeless as a percentage of extremely poor in K–12 4.Number living doubled up for every 1 in shelter 5.Percentage of UY FAFSA applicants verified as homeless

What else is in the 2015 Almanac? State Policy Ranking: housing, child care, domestic violence, food insecurity Other sections include: –State Dashboards: key data on one-page for each state –Ideas for Action: policy recommendations –Issue by Issue: in-depth discussions of key topics

One more time EHS/HS –homeless in EHS/HS ÷ all children in EHS/HS Pre-K –homeless in pre-K ÷ all poor in pre-K Grades K-12 –homeless in K-12 ÷ all extremely poor in K-12 –doubled up in K-12 ÷ sheltered in K-12 College (FAFSA) –UY verified by authority ÷ all UY FAFSA applicants Additional questions?