Last Monday, Advocates for Children of New York (AFC) released data obtained from the New York State Education Department revealing that more than 146,000 New York City students experienced homelessness this past school year. That accounts for roughly one student in eight enrolled in public schools and is an increase from the previous year by roughly 27,000 students during the onset of migrant arrivals.
Jennifer Pringle, who directs AFC’s Project Learners in Temporary Housing (LIT), says attributing the findings to the recent migrant arrivals is reductive — 2023–2024 marks the ninth straight year that the student homelessness count reached six figures.
Just as longstanding are the disproportionate impacts on Black and Brown youth. The numbers pointed to four school districts with an estimated 20% or more student population experiencing homelessness over the past school year. In eastern Brooklyn, 65% enrolled in District 23 schools are Black. Districts 4 in Upper Manhattan, 9 in the southwest Bronx, and 32 in northeast and central Brooklyn all have majority Hispanic and Latino student populations.
To be clear, student homelessness does not account only for those living on the street unaccompanied. Roughly half of those counted were “doubled up” — sharing the same unit with other households. Others lived in family shelters, where many were enrolled in schools in a different borough from where they stayed, according to Pringle.
The 146,000 figure also only gives a rough idea of the city’s student homelessness population. Unaccompanied minors are notoriously difficult to track down without shelter data, and there are many reasons why parents choose not to disclose a “doubled up” situation when the state makes the count. In addition, the numbers do not reveal the percentage of students counted in previous years compared to those newly experiencing homelessness.
“[Families or parents] may be worried that they will get [in] trouble, that the primary tenant will get in trouble, and they’ll have to leave,” said Pringle. “They may be worried that the school is asking about their housing situation because [of] their child welfare concerns. There [are] all sorts of reasons why parents may not be proactively identifying themselves.”
Compared to the 2022–2023 school year, which recorded 119,000 students experiencing homelessness, the numbers pointed to a sharp increase in sheltered students: from 40,840 to 60,395. There were also around 7,000 more doubled-up students, who make up the majority of those experiencing homelessness.
While rampant student homelessness predates the more than 210,000 migrant arrivals to New York City over the past two years, migrant youth are particularly vulnerable due to 60-day shelter evictions for families.
Sarah Jonas, vice president of the youth division at Children’s Aid, said she is “sadly unsurprised” by the findings, based on her organization’s experience in working with younger new arrivals. She has seen the biggest spike in new students in Children’s Aid community schools and centers in East Harlem, which houses District 4.
“We saw that these young people and their families were bringing a high degree of trauma — that they had experienced a great deal of trauma in the journey to come to this country,” said Jonas. “They were bringing acute mental health needs that we were jumping in to try to support with counseling and other types of support.”
Among the mental health concerns are anxiety and depression. Families also needed help with food and clean clothing, since there was a dearth of dietary options and a lack of places to do laundry. These issues were particularly exacerbated by the 60-day shelter evictions. Even with the city easing up on the rule, migrant families are still required to move, despite no longer needing to apply for shelter every two months.
“Families are going to still be forced to be moved, which creates a tremendous amount of instability,” said Pringle. “It is extremely disruptive for kids’ education. When you think about parents trying to get the family into permanent housing, that type of movement is counterproductive.
“Families have to choose between taking their kids to school and working — and working on finding permanent housing.”
Tandy Lau is a Report for America corps member who writes about public safety for the Amsterdam News. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps keep him writing stories like this one; please consider making a tax-deductible gift of any amount today by visiting https://bit.ly/amnews1.