How School Boards Can Support Kids Living in Poverty

Earlier this year, the Southern Education Foundation released a shocking report. Over half of public school students qualified for free and reduced lunches in 2013, which researchers agree is a good proxy for how many students are in poverty. No part of the country is immune to this challenge, but the South and West are most heavily affected. As illustrated in the map below, Mississippi (71%), New Mexico (68%), and Louisiana(65%) have the highest proportion of low-income students with Arkansas and Oklahoma tying at 61%.

How can districts best support kids who are facing a lack of resources and stability outside of the classroom? How does this carry over inside the classroom walls? We’ve outlined a few tested approaches.

Addressing the Rise in Homelessness

In 2014, the Department of Education estimated that there are 1.3 million homeless students attending public school. There are twice as many homeless students now than there were before the recession. The instability is stressful and traumatic for students. Homeless students are often hungry and tired, making it impossible for them to focus on classes.

Many teachers reach into their own pockets to provide these kids with food and provide for their other needs. When kids have nowhere else to turn, teachers serve as their advocates. Class starts after the basic needs of the students are met.

Establishing a set of rights for your district assures that students will not face bureaucratic barriers on top of their daily struggles to find stability. Innovative school districts, like Chicago Public Schools, have created a list of rights guaranteed to homeless students. Homeless students are enrolled immediately in any school regardless of their ability to produce the necessary paperwork. Uniforms, school supplies, additional tutoring, and lunch are all provided free of charge. Students are not only guaranteed transportation to school, but also guaranteed transportation to school-related activities, ensuring time to socialize with peers.

Put College on the Table

For kids who have had one or both parents attend college, going to college is often an expectation. These families are able to focus quality, reputation, and affordability. But not all parents have the time, the energy, or the experience to help their kids reach college.

In Northfield, Minnesota, home to some of America’s most prestigious liberal arts colleges, there has traditionally been a large achievement gap between Latino and White students. Ten years ago, 91% of high school students were graduating, while only 36% of Latino high school students received their diploma. Out of those that graduated, only one in five went on to college, a stark contrast in comparison to their white classmates who go to college 86% of the time.

As a response, the district collaborated with community organizations to create TORCH or Tackling Obstacles and Raising College Hopes. The program has been so successful that it now serves Latino students alongside first-generation college students and low-income students.

TORCH is centered around making it feasible for low-income students to apply for college. Not all parents know how to work the endlessly complicated admissions process. Middle and upper class students have access to countless resources from guide books to consultants. TORCH evens the playing field by providing tutoring with local college students, mentors from the community, and taking these low-income students on college visits to see what their options are firsthand.

Other schools encourage low-income students to consider college by doing exchanges with other high-schoolers and taking entire schools to visit Ivy Leagues.

Bold Moves

The only thing that has been proven to significantly cut the racial achievement gap in half is school integration. Between 1971 and 1988 when integration peaked, the achievement gap dropped from 40 points to 17 points.

Integration works because it gets students of color access to the same resources that white students have. Since our schools are partially funded by property taxes, wealthier and whiter neighborhoods have better schools than their poorer counterparts.

Recently, the Normandy School District in the St. Louis area ended up creating an integration program through a legal loophole. The district had been failing for years, providing an such unacceptable quality of education, it lost its accreditation.A state transfer law kicked in, giving the students the opportunity to bus to a better nearby district on Normandy’s dime.

The students who moved to the superior nearby Francis Howell School District were performing better and finally getting the quality education they deserved. After a successful year of integration, the state of Missouri took over the Normandy School District, renamed it, and changed the status from unaccredited to non-accredited (a meaningless distinction). The students were all forced to return to their local and failing district. A group of Normandy High School parents successfully sued the state of Missouri. A judge ruled that attending a failing school could cause irreparable harm and gave students a window to attend Francis Howell again. Reluctant to readmit students, Francis Howell is requiring students to get judicial permission on an individual basis.

We can all name reasons why we aren’t talking about integration as a solution for our schools. Most people believe that integration was a failure, but in reality it just ended. Integration is not without its problems, but when our poorest students aren’t able to play on a level field, don’t we have an obligation to seriously consider solutions that work? For more, listen to these two-part reports from This American Life : The Problem We All Live With Part One and Part Two.

Rising to the Challenge

Working with kids in poverty is a complex challenge and there are no easy solutions. School boards need to balance parental concerns with the promise of bold innovations and progress through experimentation.

What leaders in education can count on is a multitude of researchers, journalists, and policy advocates in their corner, always searching for the next solution alongside them.

Are you an education problem solver? Speak with someone today to learn more about using data to find patterns in your district.

About the Author: Michelle Stockwell is the product of a public school education and is in perpetual search of innovative urban solutions.