The Issue Of Homelessness And School Social Work

Homelessness in the United States is a multifaceted problem, there are many factors to consider when examining this homelessness including access to health care, economic conditions and public policy as well as a host of other issues. Problems with homelessness that need addressed are the stigmatizations of being homeless and how this perception has led to anti-homeless policies, how reforming anti-homeless policies can lead to shifting society’s perception of the issue of homelessness, and finally why social workers must be at the forefront of the campaign to facilitate meaningful change to reduce the human suffering

Kathy and Raymond have visits one day per week for two hours per day. Worker supervises these visits once per month. The first visit this worker will be supervising is on November 23, 2016. These visits occur at the Godfrey, Illinois McDonalds play place, but were taking place outside in the community prior to this when the weather is nicer. During the last supervised visit the case assistant observed Raymond reading the newspaper. The tried children interact with the case assistant; the case assistant redirects the children to interact with Kathy and Raymond. Johnathan spent most of the visit in the play place and Zoey spent most of the visit on the tablet. Raymond left the visit and returned 20 minutes later telling Kathy “they (the children)

In the United States the homeless population continues to grow rapidly. Homelessness has been a public health issue for many decades. Often times these individuals feel as though society has turned a blind eye to them. This at risk population is seen by society as lazy or chose to live a life on the streets, but if one would examine this population closely would see that there is more to this at risk population than what society has labeled them as. The forces, which affect homelessness, are multifaceted. Social forces such as family breakdown, addictions, and mental illnesses are in combined with structural forces such as lack of low-cost housing, insufficient health services, and poor economic conditions. Many would

Over half of a million people within the United States are homeless, the largest part of that group belonging to the famed and familiar city: Los Angeles. But why is it that the majority of Americans seem so unaffected by the penniless, impoverished souls harboring the areas they often visit? It was once delivered by the famed businessman and religious leader, Joseph B. Wirthlin, in an address named "Live in Thanksgiving Daily" that "The more often we the see things around us -- even the beautiful and wonderful -- the more they become invisible to us" (Wirthlin 11). The essence of Wirthlin’s wise words is that because we see certain things so often, we become desensitized and accustomed to them, leading us to acknowledge them less and less. This however, serves as a poor excuse when explaining our lack of effort in attacking and solving the social issues present in homelessness. In today’s day and age, individuals often adapt the mindset of: “Your problem, you deal with it.” But how are these human beings, who have aspirations and dreams just like you and me (that are now crushed), are supposed to just “deal” with living without a penny to their names with no possibility of finding any source of income? How are these people supposed to just “deal” with the paralyzing fear and helplessness they experience every night before they lie down on the cold, hard concrete floor of a dingy alley that they’re forced to call home for the night? Of course, they don’t. Well, more

There are many types of homelessness in our society and our community. They become homeless for different reasons; it could be intentional or uncontrolled. The two that stick out the most for my community are the push outs and the new poor. The push outs are people who are kicked out by their parents, commonly teenagers; or families and adults who are evicted from landlords. The new poor are when people become unemployed due to work skills are out-of-date because of technological changes. Some skills that are needed to help each one of these groups is to meet their current needs. As addressing the needs of the homeless it is important to focus on prevention, as well as, remediation of their problem (“What is human service,” 2011). As human service professionals should listen to their clients. When a client is speaking the clinician should pay attention, provide support, empathy, assessing, and goal setting.

In Judy Daniels’ article entitled "Humanistic Interventions for Homeless Students: Identifying and Reducing Barriers to Their Personal Development," the author is successful in describing real-life examples of the effects of homelessness on school-aged children. She starts out with the story of Angie, a high school student who lives in a tent with her mother and two siblings. After being caught for fighting with her classmates, Angie is sent to the counselor’s office where she confesses her frustration with her current living situation.

Two contemporary social problems of interest are transitional housing needs for homeless mothers and domestic violence in the African American community. Fischer (2000) wrote homeless families face the economic and personal challenges of sparse employment opportunities, child care and nutrition needs, compounded by the loss of adequate housing. Those with the greatest risk of being unemployed and of becoming long term welfare dependent are teen mothers (Fischer, 2000). In addition, depression and the loss of self-confidence are direct results of being homeless. Homelessness destroys self-esteem and promotes hopelessness.

According to the National Alliance to End Homelessness; "families experiencing homelessness are generally similar to other housed families living in poverty" (End Homelessness, 2016). These are just some of the issues that can cause homelessness. This paper will discuss how school aged students are affected by homelessness and the available interventions that are available to those in the homeless community.

With youth homelessness continuing to rise, schools are not prepared to respond to the needs of these students. Homeless youth lack the adequate support within their schools to succeed academically, socio-emotionally, and mentally, resulting in homeless youth not given the opportunity to thrive in their current setting.

The interview suggestions share a variety of ways in improving services and access to housing programs. The suggestions from respondents are structural changes geared toward increasing the affordable housing stock for more interpersonal issues, such educating staff and the public about homeless. That current and former high-risk individuals focus on the need for affordable housing and more client-centered services, in contrast, the providers spoke of the need to create service programs tailored to the high-risk cohort, and many did not believe that street dwellers could successfully move from the streets directly into housing (Meschede, 2011). One particular situation on opposing views from the consumers and services is the medical needs. Consumers of homeless programs often do not agree with their case managers on the medical needs. According to the data provided, providers see the need for psychiatric disability and substance abuse services, but consumers focused more the services for dental and medical concerns (Meschede, 2011). Some providers believe that fear of the unknown and not wanting to leave friends on the streets as a significant barrier to success housing outcomes. Current street dwellers expressed that yes they don’t know where they will go, but when they ask for help and guide for the process to follow, no one

Lakeland is a city in Polk County, Florida, United States, located between the two larger cities in central Florida those being Tampa to the west and Orlando to the east. While interventions to interrupt and end homelessness may vary across groups, ending homelessness permanently requires housing combined with the types of services supported by programs operated by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). This paper will address demographics for the area, identify the social issue of homelessness, and address using a social action model for community change, and the strengths and weaknesses of the model.

Homelessness is deemed a social problem because of the many social factors that could play a role in it. “Social forces such as addictions, family breakdown, and mental illness are compounded by structural forces such as lack of available low-cost housing, poor economic conditions, and insufficient mental health services” (Chattopadhyay, et al., 2013). Since there are many contributing factors that aid in homelessness, it has been deemed a social problem.

Homeless people are a vulnerable population in many respects that they always face discrimination and exclusion because of their housing condition. It is a social problem that typically low wages and shortage of affordable housing are the main factors contributing to homelessness. In fact, many poor people face significant barriers to maintain stable housing because they don’t have accessibilities to increase their economic stability. Overall, there are significant factors that contribute to homelessness that many homeless people usually struggle with limited access to resources, lack of information about services, and lack of support systems.

The National Alliance to End Homelessness, a leader in homelessness service and research, “estimates a seventeen percent decrease in total homelessness from 2005 to 2012” (National Alliance to End Homelessness 2)

With the number of homeless students on the rise, schools encounter new educational challenges that include: