Pursuing the Promise of Preschool: An Exploratory Investigation of the Perceptions of Parents Experiencing Homelessness
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Pursuing the Promise of Preschool: An Exploratory Investigation of the Perceptions of Parents Experiencing Homelessness Travis Wright1 · Chase Ochrach1 · Madison Blaydes1 · Anna Fetter1
© Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract Rates of homelessness are worsening in the United States, with a third of individuals experiencing homelessness being families with children. These families face many challenges, including limited social supports, insufficient access to services, and mental health concerns. These challenges inform a nuanced worldview, leading parents experiencing homelessness to understand their child’s school life in unique ways. The purpose of this study is to explore how parents experiencing homelessness understand their children’s participation in Head Start and publicly funded 4 K programs. We utilized semi-structured interviews with parents of 4 K students and applied an iterative approach for analysis to identify emergent themes and concepts. Results suggest families enter homelessness through several avenues and struggle with many aspects of homelessness, including stigma directed at parents and children. Parents identified many strengths in their children’s school programs, including education and support from faculty, as well as areas for growth, such as more comprehensive transportation and meal services. Overall, these results suggest families experiencing homelessness encounter many barriers to finding stable housing. Additionally, parents of children experiencing homelessness value their child’s education and access to resources in schools while still fearing the potential for their child to experience stigmatization and discrimination in schools. Keywords Early childhood education · Homelessness · Parents · Family engagement · Stigma
Introduction Homelessness is a large-scale issue in the United States; in 2018, 552,830 individuals experienced homelessness on a given night (National Alliance to End Homelessness 2019). Since 2017, the number of people experiencing homelessness1 increased by 0.3 percent (National Alliance to End Homelessness 2019). Almost 33% of individuals 1 We prefer to use person-first language in referencing individuals who are experiencing homelessness, recognizing that homelessness is an experience and not an identity. However, for clarity and space limitations we sometimes use the conventional term “homeless individuals”, and the like, interchangeably.
This work was supported by a grant from the Madison Education Partnership at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, the Wisconsin Center for Educational Research, and the Madison Metropolitan School District. * Travis Wright [email protected] 1
Department of Counseling Psychology, University of Wisconsin- Madison, 335 Education Building, 1000 Bascom Hall, Madison, WI 53706‑1326, USA
experiencing homelessness are families with children (U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development 2018). In the 2017 to 2018 academic year, a reported 1.5 million children in public schools experienced homelessness, which is the
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