Stimulus funding to help homeless students in Arkansas Special

Arkansas received over $644,000 in stimulus funding to aid homeless students. Top priorities are obtaining an accurate count of the homeless student population and building capacity within the school districts in order to better serve these students.

The Arkansas Department of Education announced on Monday that the state received over $644,000 in grant funding through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The federal stimulus money is designed to serve homeless students, according to The Morning News. Five districts will receive as much as $68,000 each while the other nine districts will receive between $31,300 and $40,500 each. The funding is for the 2009-2010 school year. The 14 school districts receiving funding will serve approximately 2,700 K-12 students. Diana Julian, interim state education commissioner, was quoted as saying, "We are definitely under-identifying and underserving this [homeless student] population." In a telephone interview conducted this evening with Julie Johnson Thompson, Director of Communications for the Arkansas Department of Education, she told me that the 2,700 number is based upon “data we collect that is self-reported by the districts, but the odds are that there are more homeless students in the districts.” Thompson is confident that the money will be put to good use in two primary ways. First, it will be used to obtain a more accurate count of the homeless student population. And, once students have been properly identified, the funding will enable school districts to build their capacity in order to better serve, and provide support to, homeless students. When asked if she had any concerns about problems arising when the funding ends, Thompson said, “We have given a lot of guidance to our schools to guard against that. The purpose of the funding is specifically designated to build capacity. The capacity built within the school districts will continue after the funding ends.” The capacity building efforts referred to by Thompson include professional development and training for teachers and other school officials. “It is a short-term investment that should have long-term results,” said Thompson.