Homelessness

McKinney-Vento Homeless Student Resources

The Brandywine Heights Area School District believes that that homeless youth should have access to free and appropriate public education and wishes to limit the barriers that homeless students may face. Our goal is to have the educational process continue as uninterrupted as possible while children are in homeless situations.

Who is considered homeless?

Homeless students are defined as individuals lacking a fixed, regular, and nighttime residence, which include students living in the following conditions:

Sharing the housing of other persons due to loss of housing or economic hardship.
Living in motels, hotels, trailer parks, or camping grounds due to lack of adequate alternative accommodations.
Living in an emergency, transitional, or domestic violence shelters.
Abandoned in hospitals.
Living in public or private places not designed for or ordinarily used a regular sleeping accommodations for human beings.
Living in cars, parks, public spaces, abandoned buildings, substandard housing, transportation stations, or similar settings.
Living as migratory children in conditions described in previous examples.
Living as runaway children.
Being abandoned or forced out of homes by parents/guardians or caretakers.
Living as school age unwed mothers in houses for unwed mothers if they have no other living accommodations.

The McKinney-Vento Act Requires:

homeless students who move have the right to remain in their schools of origin (i.e., the school the student attended when permanently housed or in which the student was last enrolled, which includes preschools) if that is in the student's best interest;
if it is in the student's best interest to change schools, homeless students must be immediately enrolled in a new school, even if they do not have the records normally required for enrollment;
transportation must be provided to and from a student's school of origin, at the request of a parent, guardian, or, in the case of an unaccompanied youth, the local liaison;
homeless students must have access to all programs and services for which they are eligible, including special education services, preschool, school nutrition programs, language assistance for English learners, career and technical education, gifted and talented programs, magnet schools, charter schools, summer learning, online learning, and before and after-school care;
unaccompanied youths must be afforded specific protections, including immediate enrollment in school without proof of guardianship; and
parents, guardians, and unaccompanied youth have the right to dispute an eligibility, school selection, or enrollment decision.

Unaccompanied Youth:
Unaccompanied youth include any child who is "not in the physical custody of a parent or guardian.” This includes youth who have run away from home, been thrown out of their home, been abandoned by parents or guardians, or separated from their parents for any other reason.