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Every day, thousands of students walk into school to learn and play, and after school is out, they go back to the comfort of home. But not every student who walks through the doors at school has a home to go back to. Today we begin our series on homeless students in the Ozarks, which looks at the daily struggles homeless students experience, and what the public schools are doing to help them succeed, despite these obstacles. In today’s segment, KSMU’s Adam Murphy looks at the problems a student faces in school when he or she is constantly on the move.
This past year in Springfield Public Schools alone, there were between 350 and 400 reported homeless students. These students lead very different lives than the average child, and many problems can arise because of this. One such problem is a lack of consistency in where the students attend school.
“It wasn’t very good. I mean I was the new kid my whole life, so it’s kind of hard. You get used to something, and you have to get used to something else,” said Stormie.
That’s Stormie, who spends her time at the Rare Breed Youth Services in Springfield. Although she got her GED, before reaching high school, she was never in one school longer than three months. That’s because since her mom was an addict, she was tossed from place to place staying with different people. Many students say it’s difficult to have to switch schools so much because it is hard to keep friends, they fall behind in their work, and they become less interested in their education.
Roxanne, a sixth grader staying at the Missouri Hotel homeless shelter with her mother, has dealt with this struggle her whole life. Before finishing fifth grade, she had already attended four different schools. She often fell behind in her school work as she came into new classrooms in the middle of the year.
“It was hard because when we were still working on long division at Rountree, when I moved to Boyd they were working on pre-algebra, so I didn’t know any of it. I started going down a little to about C’s, and then they went to a new one, and then I started catching on and I went back up,” Roxanne said.
She also struggled with leaving beloved teachers. She says she had to leave one of her favorite teachers when she left Rountree Elementary last November.
“I loved her, she was so sweet. She’s always been my favorite teacher. She was really cool, and I missed her really bad when we had to move,” said Roxanne
Springfield Public Schools works to combat this problem by providing consistent transportation to homeless students. Becky Morgan is the homeless student liaison for Springfield Public Schools. She says keeping them in one place helps them do better in school.
“We try to keep the students in their same school if we can find them and maybe transport them back to their original school on one of our school buses. At a lot of the shelters we do provide transportation to the nearest school. Anything we can do to try to keep them in school on a regular basis, we know is the key to a lot of their educational challenges,” said Morgan.
The school district sends buses to many locations like the Empowering Youth program at the Boys and Girls Town, the Family Violence Center, and the Missouri Hotel. This helps students keep regular attendance no matter where they are staying. A.J. is a senior staying in The Kitchen’s Transitional Living Apartment Program. He’s a teenage runaway. When he came here from Dexter, Missouri, he was on the streets for a week. He ended up at the Boys and Girls Town. He says the buses helped him stay in school.
“For about a week I didn’t really go to school. I just looked for another place to stay. The girlfriend at the time helped me find EY. The bus came every day to EY, so I went to school every day,” said A.J.
Springfield Public Schools says it tries to make sure that getting to school is one less thing homeless students have to worry about. Through its services, students like A.J. can stay in school and live out their dreams. A.J. says he plans on graduating from Central High School and becoming a Marine.
For KSMU News, I’m Adam Murphy.
