The homeless population has increased nationwide, with California leading the pack, dramatically increased by 50% over the last five years. However, less noticeable has been the corresponding rise in homeless students. Over the last two years homeless students nationwide increased by 15% and 50% in the last 15 years!
The question is what caused the rise in homeless students? The answer is complex.
First, there are natural disasters, like hurricanes, wild fires, and flooding, which have become more destructive in the last few years. Second, is the terrible rise in drug use by parents who end up homeless Third, is the rise in housing costs that make it difficult for low income families to have stable housing. Finally, more restrictive zoning enforcement and school residency requirement enforcement limits multi-family housing and remove non-family members from single family homes.
To a lesser degree is domestic violence and the rise in single mother households with little or no emotional or financial support from the ex-spouse.
There are 1.5 million students who are homeless nationwide in the 2017-18 school year and this has continued to increase over the years. Will this number continue to increase? Under the Trump administration, I see little reason to look at the Federal government to help the situation. How the States and Local goverment5s address the homelessness issue is dependent on the allocation of funds and community support, any iffy proposition at best.
The New York Times has a nice article on the causes of the student homelessness issue... Here