New York City school officials haven’t adequately addressed numerous challenges faced by the 25,000 homeless students who live in city shelters, despite becoming aware of them in the spring, according to advocacy groups.
Among the lingering problems: Most shelters still don’t have Wi-Fi access, and some have inadequate cell reception; children aren’t allowed to stay in their shelter units without a parent, some of whom have to go to work during the day; the city’s new free childcare program will have limited capacity; and some parents haven’t received information about busing services.
Jetia Byfield’s four children are among those struggling to deal with remote learning from a shelter unit. She has to return to her job as a middle school teacher in Chinatown next week. Her children, who are between the ages of 11 and 17, have chosen remote learning. But they won’t be allowed to stay alone in their unit.
Byfield’s shelter, Jackson Avenue Family Residence in the Bronx, has come up with a solution: reorganizing its recreation center so kids can attend socially distanced remote learning.
“We're shifting to accommodating more tables that may seat just one child and then a staff member or another child at the other end of that table,” said Megan Wendt, an educational specialist at BronxWorks, the non-profit that runs the shelter.
While most shelters don’t have Wi-Fi, over the summer BronxWorks secured a grant to install it. The city has refused to provide data on exactly how many shelters still lack reliable Wi-Fi.
Because Wi-Fi was unavailable in many shelters this spring when schools were closed, the Department of Education distributed cellular-enabled tablets to students. But some homeless students didn’t receive them on time and others had issues using them.
“There are shelters where the iPads that New York City provided don't work due to lack of cell phone reception and other shelters where connectivity is limited,” said Randi Levine, the policy director at Advocates for Children of New York.
Those issues persist even now as the school year is restarting, she said.
“Even before the pandemic significant disparities existed between New York City students who are homeless and their permanently housed peers,” Levine said. “The pandemic only magnified these inequities.”
City education officials say all homeless students will have access to tablets with cell data, and they’ve set up a new citywide free childcare system where homeless students will get priority.
“We’ve been working hard to ensure our students experiencing homelessness have the tools and resources they need to succeed this school year, whether they are learning in school or remotely,” said Sarah Casasnovas, a Department of Education spokeswoman.
These issues compound already acute problems with getting adequate education for homeless children. Before the pandemic, 40 percent of the students at Byfield’s shelter were chronically absent. And then in March the shelter stopped receiving attendance records from the Department of Education. The city hasn’t released any data on homeless student engagement from the spring.
