HOUSING EMERGENCIES

  • McKinney-Vento Program

    Overview and Support

    At times, students’ families may experience housing emergencies or crises. Services are available for students whose families are experiencing a housing crisis and lack fixed, regular and adequate overnight accommodations.

    A housing crisis is defined as:

    • Living with a friend, relative or someone else because you do not have permanent housing
    • Living in motels, hotels, trailer parks or camping grounds due to lack of alternative adequate accommodations
    • Living in emergency, transitional or domestic violence shelters
    • Living in cars, parks, public spaces, bus or train stations or similar settings

    Please contact the social worker, counselor or other support staff member at your child’s school for information regarding support available for your child.

    If your child is not in school, or if you have any other questions, you may contact Sonia Jenkins, the CMS McKinney-Vento manager at (980) 343-1077.

    The McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, reauthorized in 2015 by the Every Student Succeeds Act, (ESSA), is the primary piece of federal legislation dealing with the education of children and youth experiencing homelessness.

    Subtitle B of Title VI of the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act defines “homeless” as follows:

    The term “homeless children and youths” –

    1. means individuals who lack a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence (within the meaning of section 103(a)(1))
    2. includes –
      1. children and youths who are sharing the housing of other persons due to loss of housing, economic hardship, or a similar reason; are living in motels, hotels, trailer parks, or camping grounds due to the lack of alternative adequate accommodations; are living in emergency or transitional shelters; are abandoned in hospitals
      2. children and youths who have a primary nighttime residence that is a public or private place not designed for or ordinarily used as a regular sleeping accommodation for human beings (within the meaning of section 103(a)(2)(C)) 
      3. children and youths who are living in cars, parks, public spaces, abandoned buildings, substandard housing, bus or train stations, or similar settings
      4. migratory children (as such term is defined in section 1309 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965) who qualify as homeless for the purposes of this subtitle because the children are living in circumstances described in clauses (i) through (iii)