School districts in Texas illegally suspend homeless youth

The National Center for Homeless Education reported that Texas is home to 10 percent of the country’s homeless youth: 93,000 students in Texas school districts report homelessness, according to Texas Network for Youth Services.

However, an on-site investigation found that these schools may be contributing to the problem.

A Houston Landing Investigation Report — examining state data, annual school discipline reports, and interviewing former students — found that Texas school districts are experiencing a number of illegal student suspensions. Why is this “illegal,” you ask? The report cites a 2019 state law that prohibits schools from issuing suspensions outside of school. for students with known housing insecurity if the incident in question did not involve weapons or violence.

The school districts identified include the Houston Independent School District, with 22 percent black students, and the Beaumont Independent School District, with 59 percent black students.

The report acknowledged that it was difficult to determine the exact number of illegal suspensions for several reasons. including homeless students after a suspensionHowever, youths who spoke to the newspaper told reporters that discipline led to serious academic and personal consequences.

“If I hadn’t missed so much school because of simple things like bullying, I probably would have graduated with a 3.0 or 4.0. At the end of the day, school wasn’t hard. It wasn’t the math, it wasn’t the science, it wasn’t algebra, it wasn’t geometry. It wasn’t any of that. It was literally like the things I was facing were mixed in with administration,” 25-year-old Brandon Williams told Landing.

Data reviewed by Houston Landing suggests that the districts Practicing suspensions at two-thirds the rate this happened before the law was even signed and sealed. Despite the violations, the news agency notes that neither school officials nor lawmakers have enforced the law.

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Despite repeated violations of the 2019 law, the Texas Education Agency has not investigated or penalized districts that violated the rules.

TEA spokesman Jake Kobersky said the agency can only launch investigations into allegations of misconduct in response to complaints from the public. State regulations do not require the agency to enforce the suspension law, but they give the state’s education commissioner – who leads the TEA – broad authority to launch an investigation if he deems it “necessary.”

When Landing’s findings were presented, one of the bill’s co-signers, Rep. Eugene Wu (D-Houston), said lawmakers should amend the law during next year’s session. Wu said lawmakers “made clear provisions in the law” but left out enforcement measures, allowing counties to bypass it without consequences.

However, all hope is not lost: some measures have Measures have been taken to support these young people.

For example, local legal organization Texas Apple Core took the initiative and supported a 2019 bill that would allow homeless youth to avoid all fees for issuing legal documents such as identity cards or driver’s licenses.

However, this organization and others continue to work to secure the rights of homeless minors and push for the enforcement of laws to protect homeless youth. Currently, thousands of students are still in limbo.