Homeless with Homework

Student Homelessness: A New York City Public School Teacher Speaks

Posted on 11. May, 2010 by Dale Eisinger in THE RIGHT TO AN EDUCATION

by Dale W. Eisinger

A career teacher with the New York City school system shared her thoughts on homeless youth – teaching them, interacting with them, and observing how they learn. She taught in two middle schools in Brooklyn in the 1970s and wanted to remain anonymous, for fear of losing her pension – she still teaches part time. Below is an excerpt of her interview.

“Many of these children had such spotty attendance it was nearly impossible to decide on promotion. So much of the care of the children is on the individual schools and administrators. The Department of Education does not show any compassion, in my opinion, just by the way the children are moved about.”

ON STUDENT TEMPERAMENT
“The homeless kids often stand out. Even in a poor school, with many kids on welfare and in poverty, they still have the comforts of an apartment, even in public housing. The child in the shelter will be the child whose clothes are dirty or worn for many days. Many of the homeless children in shelters were placed there in an emergency situation – domestic violence perhaps – so they often leave in such a hurry the clothes on their backs is all they take. I always taught in poor schools, with poverty and minority children who exhibited little compassion for each other. Often the children in the shelters would be tired, because the mothers would worry about the family’s personal safety while they slept. Usually an older child might have to stay awake so the few possessions they owned would not be taken. I would find it shocking that so many of my students did not have family pictures. If you lived in a shelter you had no space to store anything.”

ON ADJUSTING A CURRICULUM
“As a teacher, I would often have to adjust how I spoke to the classes to be aware of the variety of home situations that existed. You soon learn not to give an assignment where the children are asked to watch a TV show, since some could not. I can remember one child who was excited to be in a play that we were planning one spring. She tried out for the role when she came to the school, living in a shelter. Of course, by the week before the show, her family was shipped off somewhere else and I never saw her again. As a teacher, I could have learned a lesson that some teachers expressed, do not give shelter children a part in a play. But I remembered how happy that little girl was to try out and get the part. The lesson I learned, was to always have an understudy. But this is how these kids live. Everything is temporary and in transition. They have so little to call their own, and so many of them are happy to be in a classroom and take ownership of something.”

ON CONSTANT MOBILITY
“Very often the children would be in Queens one day and next in the Bronx if an apartment was available. No thought or consideration was given to consistency in their education. Looking at children’s records would indicate 6-8 schools in one school year. The city does not consider keeping children in a community. As educators we were told to take responsibility for the textbooks. The schools did not like to lose hard cover textbooks as children moved from place to place. But in the schools I worked we never counted the missing books. If a child moved or knew he or she was moving, we never asked for a book back. The children would move so much their records never actually caught up with them, so as a teacher, I had to constantly try to figure out what each child knew. Many of these children had such spotty attendance it was nearly impossible to decide on promotion. So much of the care of the children is on the individual schools and administrators. The Department of Education does not show any compassion, in my opinion, just by the way the children are moved about.”

ON FOOD AND SECURITY
“The children I encountered from shelters wanted to come to school every day because of the food, security, and care they received. As teachers, we were told if we had a shelter child by our principals. They wanted us to give extra care and concern and maybe overlook some of the general rules. For example, there are limits to the amount of meals of child can take in the lunchroom. Usually kids take a second meal and just eat what they like and throw the rest away. We were advised to allow unlimited food for the shelter children. There were not refrigerators at home or cupboard with cookies. I would often pack extra food in bags to go to the shelter with them.”

Tags: educator, educators, teacher, teacher thoughts