Support Services for Students Residing in Transitional Housing in Academy for Future Leaders

A WebQuest for 7^th & 8^tth Grade (Social Studies)

The Problem: Youth Residing in Transitional Housing

Introduction
Many homeless young people face a day-to-day struggle to survive which can lead to physical and emotional harm. Homeless youth may have experienced family abuse, violence, rejection, and instability that led to their homelessness. However, the growing population of students living in temporary housing has impacted the services that these youth are supposed to receive in school.

The Task
As a youth organizer in your school, it will be your responsibility to create a group of your peers to research and distribute information about the support services needed for homeless students in your school and what methods of distribution will be used to inform your school community about the entitled resources that is supposed to be available to students residing in temporary housing.

NECESSARY INFORMATION:

Define homelessness and identify the contributing factors that contribute to homelessness.
Explore how the legal definitions of homelessness change public perspective of homelessness influences public policy and program support.
Interview three (3) of your peers living in temporary housing. Ask them to define homelessness and share four reasons of what are the causes of homelessness. Create an informational flyer to show your findings.
Collaborate with your partner to create a strategy that could help to manage the problem of homelessness.
As a team, create and present a flyer, brochure and/or presentation using Google Slides informing the your community of your recommendations to ensure that students living in transitional housing are receiving a free and appropriate public education.

Process:

Your group will use the public policy analyst (PPA) tool to help guide your research in your project. The elements of the public policy analyst are listed below in detail.

Identify the nature of a problem:

Students will work in teams of two using Your group will use Worksheet #1: Define the Problem to identify the increase of students residing in transitional housing.

Gather evidence to support your problem.

You and your partner will use Worksheet #2: Gather Evidence to gather evidence that will support your research.

§ You and your partner will gather research on homelessness in your school.

§ One partner will work on gathering research on the McKinney-Vento Act.

§ One partner will research what platforms will be appropriate to promote their findings.

§ Once your team has identified their findings on if students in transitional housing are receiving a free and appropriate public education in your school and the findings are agreed upon, teams will work together to create an informational source for distribution in the form of a pamphlet, brochure, flyer, Google Slide presentation detailing their findings on if students in transitional housing are receiving a free and appropriate public education.

· Presentation of findings.

Determine the causes and factors contributing to the problem.

You and your partner will use Worksheet #3: Identify Causes to help identify the causes of homelessness in New York City.

· You and your partner will Use Worksheet #3 identify the causes of homelessness in New York City as it relates to whether or not students residing in transitional housing are receiving a free and appropriate public education.

Evaluate the existing policy

Use Worksheet #4: Evaluating Policy to evaluate the current policy on homelessness and educating students in transitional housing.

Develop public policy alternatives

Use Worksheet #5: Public Policy Alternatives to create additional public policy alternatives based on the evaluation you and your partner will have conducted on current policies on homelessness and educating students in transitional housing.

Determine the best public policy solution to the problem.

Use Worksheet #6: Best Policy Solution to identify the best public policy solution to your problem and explain why you and your partner have chosen this particular solution and how this solution can be implemented.

RESOURCES:

· https://www.safehorizon.org/streetwork/

· https://www.acf.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/fysb/mckvenapp20120829.pdf

· http://publicpolicylab.org/our-work/

· https://flippedtips.com/plegal/ppa/intro.html

· https://www.coalitionforthehomeless.org/basic-facts-about-homelessness-new-york-city/

· https://www.homelesshub.ca/solutions/housing-accommodation-and-supports/transitional-housing

· https://www.coalitionforthehomeless.org/basic-facts-about-homelessness-new-york-city-data-and-charts/

· https://www.politico.com/states/new-york/city-hall/story/2020/06/29/new-york-is-facing-a-potential-explosion-in-homelessness-1296100

· https://council.nyc.gov/data/homeless/

· https://endhomelessness.org/homelessness-in-america/homelessness-statistics/state-of-homelessness-report/new-york/

Evaluation:
The rubric below will be used to develop a score for your webquest. Describe to the learners how their performance will be evaluated. Specify whether there will be a common grade for group work vs. individual grades.

Category:	Beginning 1	Developing 2	Accomplished 3	Exemplary 4	Score and Notes
Organization	Content is well organized using headings.	Uses headings or bulleted lists to organize, but overall organization of topics appears flawed.	Content is logically organized for the most part.	There was no clear or logical organizational structure.
Content	Covers topic in-depth with details and examples. Subject knowledge is excellent.	Includes essential knowledge about the topic. Subject knowledge appears to be good.	Includes essential information about the topic but there are 1-2 factual errors.	Content is minimal OR there are several factual errors.
Sources	Source information collected for all graphics, facts and quotes. All documented in desired format.	Source information collected for all graphics, facts and quotes. Most documented in desired format.	Source information collected for graphics, facts and quotes, but not documented in desired format.	Very little or no source information was collected.
Presentation	Well-rehearsed with smooth delivery that holds audience attention.	Rehearsed with fairly smooth delivery that holds audience attention most of the time.	Delivery not smooth, but able to maintain interest of the audience most of the time.	Delivery not smooth and audience attention often lost.

Conclusion:
For this project, you and your partner will define “Homelessness” as:

1. Being without a home, therefore, typically living on the streets.

2. The state of having no home.

3. Transitional housing is a form of social housing assistance for people who are homeless or at risk of homelessness.

4. Transitional housing refers to a supportive – yet temporary – type of accommodation that is meant to bridge the gap from homelessness to permanent housing by offering structure, supervision, support (for addictions and mental health, for instance), life skills, and in some cases, education and training.

You have worked hard in using the PPA model in solving the problem of lack of resources for students living in transitional housing and educating us on the importance of ensuring that the McKinney-Vento Act is known to the public as it relates to a free and public education for all students. Because of your hard work and informative materials, society is aware of the