Imagine this: you and your father have been made homeless. With nowhere else to go, you end up living in a car. But you still have to go to school every day.
Would you want to be in the classroom? And if you did attend, considering a lack of sleep, food and clean clothes, do you think you’d perform at your full potential? It’s likely you’d act out. Which then could lead to exclusion from mainstream school.
Sadly, this kind of situation is the reality for many young people. Emma Bradshaw, head of The Limes College pupil-referral unit (PRU) in Sutton, South London, told Tes that now more than half of her pupils have housing problems, three times as many as in 2010. The above example isn’t a hypothetical: it’s one of her pupils.
It’s a widespread issue. In June, government statistics showed that 82,310 households in England were in temporary accommodation - up more than 70 per cent compared with the end of 2010.
Paul Noblet, head of public policy at London-based homelessness charity Centrepoint, said that nearly four in 10 of the young people it sees have fewer than five GCSEs at A*-C and more than half have mental health problems. “There does seem to be a correlation of people struggling with mental health because of what’s happening at home and the lowering of educational attainment. More people being referred into PRUs is perhaps a symptom of what is going on,” he said.
The housing charity Shelter spoke to teachers about the effect of homelessness on pupils. Children became more stressed and anxious, the teachers said. Younger children tended to withdraw, while teens often became aggressive. “Not having a permanent home has a massive impact on children’s ability to participate in school successfully,” said one secondary teacher quoted in the 2017 report. “It can hold them back as they feel different to everybody.”
Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said schools were “increasingly having to pick up the pieces caused by increasing levels of pupil poverty and cuts to local services”.
