IMPACT ON HOMELESS CHILDREN
Statistics regarding homeless families (especially children) indicate that they face additional stressors that affect their mobility to progress.
“Children who lack a stable home are vulnerable to a number of adverse outcomes. Some threats, such as poverty and hunger, may precede episodes of homelessness; others stem directly from living without a home. Homeless children are more likely than other children to have moderate to severe acute and chronic health problems, and less access to medical and dental care. Children without stable homes are more than twice as likely as others to repeat a school grade, be expelled or suspended, or drop out of high school. A quarter or more of homeless children have witnessed violence and more than half have problems with anxiety and depression.” https://www.childtrends.org/indicators/homeless-children-and-youth/ 2017
In addition to these conditions, the most prevalent and persistent impact on African American/black families against other ethnic groups taken within the U.S. according to the same report from child trends. In addition, we now see the threat from a further erosion of the very social infrastructure that will increase the “abyss between the haves and have nots.”
Black families are disproportionately represented among homeless families with children. In 2013, approximately 48 percent of sheltered homeless families with children were black, although black families made up just 14 percent of U.S. families with children, and 29 percent of families with children in poverty. Conversely, white families with children were under-represented: while they comprised 54 percent of all families with children, whites accounted for 23 percent of sheltered homeless families. Similarly, while Hispanics comprised 23 percent of families with children, and 36 percent of those in poverty, they made up just 22 percent of the sheltered homeless population” .” https://www.childtrends.org/indicators/homeless-children-and-youth/ December 2017
