Some students just want a bed of their own

MAT-SU — The weeks leading up to the beginning of another school year are exciting for most children. They’re getting new back-to-school clothes, supplies and making plans to meet up with friends after the summer break.

Going back to school fills a purpose that goes beyond education for what’s being identified as a significant percentage of Mat-Su Borough School District students. For those youths, schools are the most stable foundations they have.

Last school year, the district identified more than 900 students considered to be “in transition,” which means they’re either homeless or don’t have a stable place to call home, said Debbie Niekamp, a 24-year teacher in the MSBSD and now the district’s Families in Transition program coordinator.

Some homeless students are younger children in families that are either living at local church shelters or with friends, and many are teens who “couch surf” from place to place, staying with friends for a few days or weeks.

These children and teens are more than statistics to Michael P. Carson, a Mat-Su Coalition of Housing and Homelessness member and retired teacher who spent 33 years in the MSBSD. He recalls an interview with some students last year and the impact of their stories.

“What I have found is that school is probably the last lifeline for many of these kids,” he said. “And Burchell (High School) is ground zero for these kids. That is the place they are getting some real basic needs met. They’re one step away, I believe, from being almost to the point where if they lose that connection, society will see the results of it.”

He recalls one student answering a question about what he wants out of life. The teen’s father is a sex offender living in the state correctional system and his mother was last known to be a prostitute on the streets of Anchorage.

“Here’s this young man trying to go to school and trying to be at school, and what he wanted more than anything else was, as he put it, ‘I would just like a bed. I just want a bed I can call mine.’” Carson said. “That kid really sticks out as an omen on the end of the spectrum of those just hanging on. I don’t know where this kid gets his hope. Maybe it’s because he’s attending Burchell and it’s ground zero. He’s getting breakfast and lunch there, he can see the nurse.”

Of the more than 900 youths in transition identified by the district the past school year, more than 300 of them were at Burchell, Niekamp said. Homelessness is a situation that can have a noticeable affect on those students’ academic progress.

It’s difficult to concentrate on academics in the classroom when you’re trying to figure out where your next meal is coming from or where you’re going to sleep that night, she said. There also are challenges with finding good places and times to do homework after school lets out.

“They have many extra challenges, from school supplies to the amount of homework they’re given to physical barriers from not having a stable place to call home,” she said. “A lot of these kids end up either dropping out or scoring lower on test scores or not doing well in school just because their physical environments make it difficult for them to have what they need.”

That’s what Michelle Overstreet sees as the graduation coach at Burchell. Until she saw firsthand the problem of homelessness in the school district, especially at BHS, “it was like a frying pan in the face,” she said. “I was a volunteer there for a semester when kids were talking about not having seen their mom or dad for three or four months, or they were couch surfing. I had to rethink my whole strategy about goal-setting.”

She was in that same interview with Carson, and when the young man said he hadn’t had a bed to call his own for three years, she said that’s when it hit her why those students often struggle to achieve in the classroom.

“They’re thinking about where they’re going to sleep tonight, where am I going to shower, am I going to eat tonight,” she said. “For me, that’s the bottom line. It just makes it really hard for me to help them achieve and set goals when they don’t even know where they’re going to sleep.”

She recalls the desperate look on the face of one girl who had her backpack stolen. Everything she had in the world, including clothing, was in it. Overstreet also remembers a young man who was talking about “how it’s so undignified to not have a place to put your stuff,” she said. “He said, ‘It’s not like I’m looking for luxuries like running water or electricity.’”

While the stories can be heartbreaking, Niekamp said her focus is on how the school district can help address its families in transition. Of the more than 900 students identified last school year, she said 54 percent were in high school, 17 percent middle school and 29 percent in elementary school.

One goal for the district is to raise awareness of the problem and try to break through some of the stigma surrounding homelessness. Many people are embarrassed to admit their situation, she said.

In fact, although she taught in the MSBSD for 24 years, until she started her new post as the Families in Transition coordinator, “I had absolutely no idea the extent of the problem in the Valley,” Niekamp said. “One of our goals it to create an awareness of the problem. Until we can identify these kids, we can’t provide them services.”

One specific way the district is trying to help is through its new Stuff the Bus campaign in association with Walmart. By encouraging people to buy extra school supplies, enough to fill the school bus sitting outside.

The district is making progress on identifying its students in transition, she said.

“We’re really pushing not only to give them the physical support that they need — backpacks or a laundry voucher or a gas voucher — we’re really going to push by monitoring their academic progress as well,” Niekamp said.

If you are facing the challenges of being without a stable home or know a student in that situation, the best way of getting help is to contact a school counselor, nurse or administrator, Niekamp said. You can also call her office at 746-9228.

“Until you can get to the level where kids can be successful, they’re just not going to want to be in school,” she said.

Contact Greg Johnson at greg.johnson@frontiersman.com or 352-2269.