Emma: Welcome to today's episode on the corner of homelessness and public schools. I'm Emma Hughes. And I'm Joe Ader. And today we get the opportunity to talk to Amy Hawk. Amy Hawk works in East Valley School District in the Student Services Arena and really just wears a lot of hats. I'm excited to sit down with Amy, but first our disclaimer that homelessness is a complex issue. We often see people choose incorrect simple answers over correct and complex ones, which is why we intentionally want to slow down and explore various aspects of homelessness. We want it to feel complex because it is complex. Now we don't claim to explore every part of this interaction but hope that each conversation brings new clarity to the reality as a whole. So please keep an open, curious mind as we explore complexity and seek to learn with us just as we are also learning. With that said, let's jump into it. Amy, welcome to the podcast.

Amy: Thank you for having me.

Emma: Tell us a little bit about you and what is Student Services? What is the McKinney-Vento liaison role?

Amy: So as far as student services go, I work with students, [in] different districts. I work with foster kiddos. I work with homeless kiddos with McKinney-Vento. I work with truancy. So those are the major three.

Emma: That's really incredible. How did you end up in this kind of central service point with so many different expertise?

Amy: It's social work that kind of covers it, right? Social work and children and families that has kind of always been my area. I did family support for 21 years and then I left East Valley and went to work for CCS where I did Community Colleges of Spokane where I did training and monitoring of Spokane County-wide for ECAP, which is Early Childhood Educational Assistance Program. Wow.

Emma: Yeah, you've done a little bit of everything. One of the things that I'm excited about for today's conversation is we see a lot of people experiencing homelessness on the streets, you know, out in the public, downtown, right? There's kind of this mental image of what a homeless person looks like.

And we don't often think of schools as having homeless people in them.

But as we've explored throughout the podcast, families experience homelessness and other challenges all the time. And so really you are on the front lines of engaging with these families and these kids that are, quote unquote, homeless people in the United States. What caused you to want to be on the front lines serving students and kids in that situation?

Amy: I think our kids in our community, kids even nationwide, they're just important. They're our future. We really do need to invest in our kids. I've worked with the juvenile justice system too. I kind of volunteer in a mentor program there and see the results of that. Many of those kids are also homeless. Our kids matter. Our families matter.

Joe: So, one of the things that was mentioned already is you're the McKinney-Vento liaison. Can you explain what that is a little bit, what McKinney-Vento is, and how it impacts schools and students?

Amy: McKinney-Vento is a federal law that was enacted. And really the goal of McKinney-Vento is to create that stability for kids throughout the school year with homeless kids and so forth. In the past, they've gone to multiple schools, and we still see that quite a bit. But we really want to look at what's in the best interest of our kids. Sometimes schools, that only stability thing that they have when their couch surfing, moving from place to place, shelters and cars, motels, doubled up with others. School just becomes that only stable thing for them.

Emma: What does the McKinney-Vento law provide?

Amy: There's two main things that we do and transportation. So, if you're outside of our district, then we provide that transportation meals. And then we just kind of connect families to resources in the community. And it kind of depends on their situation, what those needs are. If you meet the families where they're at, sometimes they're staying with grandparents. The grandparents help to meet all of those needs that they have. Clothing food, just different resources there. Other times we start with very basic things, and we look at income-wise and employment and how creating a goal with them and just kind of step-by-step on how to get there.

Joe: How do you find out that a child is experiencing homelessness in your district?

Amy: So, there's a couple of ways. I would say that it's like a team effort definitely within our district. Sometimes it's through the registers. A lot of times when kids enroll, they fill out a housing questionnaire. And so that gives us information as far as [how] are they doubled up? What is their housing situation?

Is this temporary? But I wouldn't say that the registers are the only key aspects within the schools. Our counselors, sometimes it's students that are unaccompanied that are self-referring. Our bus drivers, our custodians, anyone really that comes into contact with kids. And then we sometimes have outside agencies too that called [and is] like this kiddos in your district.

And so, I think they'll qualify. Then we reach out and kind of go from there. We also get some referrals from law enforcement as well. We have a great homeless outreach. Actually, we have two homeless outreach officers in the valley, which is where our school district [is].

Joe: We actually have a board member who when he was registering his kids for school, saw that question. And that's what triggered him to find out, want to find out more about kids and families that were experiencing homelessness because he was registering his own kids and he said, “you know, I never even thought about homeless kids and registering them for school. And so it made me want to look into it more.”

And that's how he found his way to us and now is on our board. But it was started from that questionnaire right at the beginning of registering for school. I think that's an interesting thing that I think a lot of people don't think about that aspect of it.

Amy: A lot of homeless families, don't have the documents that are needed for school enrollment. So that's part of McKinney-Vento too, is that we want those kids enrolled right away. So, the documents that are needed, the birth certificate, the immunization, the proof of residency, all of those kinds of things, we just kind of waive that.

If there's any fees for things like classes that they're going to need, we kind of covered those things as well. Outside sports, I mean, we really want our kids to feel that sense of belonging. So, we want to connect them with the school as much as possible. Providing those kinds of things really just helps our kids to connect and feel like they belong. It kind of feels to me like

Emma: You all are the angels in the background. Just kind of making things work and helping the kids get to school and have lunch and be able to participate fully, like you said, in the life of the school and to be just like any other kid that's really beautiful.

Amy: We never want our kids to be singled out or feel like the other kids don't know that they're homeless per se. And we wouldn't want that. We want equality for all of our kids. With our kids that are homeless, there are quite few more challenges sometimes. They may be on a bus for a long period of time, have to get up super early. We do use other forms of transportation as well, vans, Uber services, things like that. Whatever we can do to help to maintain that stability for those kids is what we do.

Emma: You said something there that I've always wondered about. Kids don't always know that they are homeless by definition. It's just they're normal, right? Some kids may know, but some kids really may not know. Yet you're really relying on lots of different ways to identify if a kid may need extra support. How do you engage with the parents of the kid versus the kid themselves?

Amy: When I contact parents, when I talk about our kids and families, I like to say housing instability. As far as that goes, because homelessness does have a huge stigma to it.

When you talk about it as experiencing housing instability, I think that you get more response as far as parents go. And then we can kind of start that conversation. We do an intake. Once I get that initial information, I would call the families and kind of figure out what their situation is. If they are indeed experiencing housing instability or say they moved here from another state or something. And that was by choice, living with grandparents. That is a double-edged situation, but they are not homeless. They are not experiencing housing instability.

It's where those, I guess, those facilities are not adequate. We have kids that are living in campgrounds, tents. We have one kid, and he's unaccompanied, and he went to the library, and he took a survival class. He decided that he could stay down by the river and he's going to survive over the summer, trying to connect him to those resources as far as, okay, where can you go to take a shower?

There's a local gym that offers free membership to all kids during the summer. And that also gives him something to do. We gave him resources as far as housing, connected him with VOA, which is volunteers of America, so that they could help get him food benefits and hook him up with medical services as well. We try to do all of those things. Gave him information for CrossLock, which is our youth shelter that is in Spokane, which is an organization in the valley. They have a facility where you can come in and do laundry. They provide all of the detergent, all of those things. I think just really working with outside agencies and connecting those kids and families to that is important.

Joe: I mean, we're recording this. We're in the summertime right now, and you're a school-based employee, and schools take a lot of summer off, but you don't.

Amy: I do not.

Joe: Can you share just a little bit about the types of things you do in the summer and how that might differ from the school year and just how that looks and works?

Amy: It is a little bit more laid back in the summer, but homelessness does not take a break. You do have families that you're still working with. You're reaching out to with your organization with Family Promise, our school-based case manager works during the summer, too, which is amazing.

And I love it. 

You know, those kids still need those resources. Another thing that I do during that time is I will go back and call every single family, [to] kind of see what their situation is. Do they need additional resources? Because we have over 300 kids that, and I'm just one person. And so with that, I can always follow up with those families. The higher needs families, they will definitely be in contact with me quite a bit. But some of those other families that are doubled up, that are living with grandparents, that may be refugees that are living with the host family, that they have the majority of resources they need, but they would still qualify for McKinney-Vento. 

Those families, I don't really contact them a whole lot through the year. Counselors at the high school, the middle school, elementary schools spend more time working with them. It's a team effort. It really and truly is with everyone in our district, our principals, our assistant principals, all the way down to our bus drivers.

Emma : One of the things that I have been hearing you say that I really want to specifically call out is, I think there's a stigma in homeless services and in the community at large when they think of a homeless person or a housing unstable person, is that they don't want help.

They don't want to get housed. Bringing forward a solution and saying, like, hey, I'd love to provide these resources. Like, I think there's almost this mental stigma sometimes of like, well, but you're just going to throw resources out on there just stuck in there.

You know, like, in all the stereotypical sense. But what I'm hearing you say is, at least when it comes to parents and families, parents are so willing and responsive to the opportunity to receive resources that better the situation for themselves and their kids. Like, you say, hey, are you housing unstable right now? Yes, great.

How can we help you? Not that's the end of the conversation. Go away. I'm so embarrassed and I, you know, what I'm sure you deal with some sense of embarrassment from the parents at different points, but that willingness to accept the resources to use the resources and to collaborate with you as a helper seems to be kind of a hallmark of how you continue to provide the experiences to improve the lives of families.

Amy: Working with families too, I mean, you always have to assume positive intent. These families are working really, really hard and, you know, it's not their fault that they have experienced that a lot of times. There's just multiple reasons for homelessness. Job loss is a huge one.

Health problems is another one. This year we had five parents pass away that were McKinney-Fentale kiddo, our families, and one child as well. I mean, there's just so, so much trauma, generational trauma, domestic violence. There's just a lot that these kids and families are dealing with.

And it's like, they're really, really trying. You know, the majority are working. If they lose a job, what can we do to help you to gain that employment? What can we do as far as helping with budgeting?

We really need to just go step by step. Throwing resources at a family, I think is great, but not too many. If I were given like all of these crazy resources at once, it just kind of overwhelms them.

So, it's really a step by step process. And what do you need at this point in time? Recently [I] had a mom and she has two kiddos, middle school and high school, and they lost their housing due to the significant other passing away. No transportation at all. These guys were literally out on the street. Mom was [scared], she grabbed what they could. Bikes, backpacks, stuff, stuff in it. They had gotten eviction notices and kind of ignored them. Just overwhelmed.

Just a lot of being overwhelmed with the situation and just survival mode, dealing from day to day. When this, mom was able to get a tent and stay in somebody's backyard, that was a step up. I actually just talked to her yesterday and they were able to get a car.

So now they can live in their car. The next step is actually a school-based case manager is working with them as well. Working on probably the next step is getting them into a shelter. Mom has tried.

She has tried to get into the shelter, but all of the shelter space is full. They have two dogs. Right now those dogs are really, really important because they kind of alert her to people that are around, things that are unsafe for her. That's, just the comfort of having those dogs as well. When you're going through that, there's a lot of anxiety, a lot of stress. There's mental health issues.

There's just a lot of things that you're dealing with. That's the next step for her is getting into a shelter. Then from there, you know, housing, if I threw housing at her right away, that's not where she's at. You really have to meet them where they're at.

Emma: What about having housing available right now might not be a good fit for her?

Amy: Well, if there was funding and she had that, you know, that way to continue to support that and be able to stay in her housing, would be fabulous. She does not have that right now. She has $950 a month. She was working part time at a local fast food restaurant 20 hours a week. And that kind of went away as well due to circumstances and so forth, not having transportation, not being able to get there, not having the funds for a bus pass.

Even the kids get to ride the bus free in our community, but, but parents don't. So even having just something simple like that is, is huge, is huge. And I do think that, you know, there's a huge stigma around that as far as this parent should be working. That they should look at their kids and do what's best for the kids. And really they are. They're doing the best they can with the resources and skills that they have.

Joe: That's a really clear example of all the different factors that kind of play into this. How does that show up in children in school and their behavior in school kids that are experienced housing and stability and homelessness? Is there things that, that are recognizable in school with them or challenges related to those students and how they perform in school?

Amy: Well, I think that, you know, the biggest thing is that sense of belonging, right? With kids just needing things like clothes, laundry is huge. It's a huge barrier and breaking down that barrier, we can do the laundry at school. We do see kids that are tired. We do see kids that are hungry. We make sure that those resources are provided.

We work with a lot of local churches that provide things like just basic need items for our kids. So, we always have like deodorant, shampoo, all of those things kind of on hand. I mean, that's huge, right? If you're a teenager and you don't have deodorant, that's pretty big.

If you don't have access to a shower, who wants to go to school and have that? Definitely not setting this kid up for success, right? Those little things that matter, school supplies, waving fees for ASB cards. We want our kids to participate at all levels and truancy. I guess truancy is huge, huge, huge with, with our McKinney-Vento kids. It just crosses over when, when you're experiencing housing instability, mental health issues, things like that, you don't end up going to school a lot of times. You're taking care of younger siblings that may be not school age.

You're taking care of your parents because they're so overwhelmed that they can't deal with the situation. Sometimes there are substance use. There's just a number of things that kind of go into that and why kids aren't showing up for school.

Emma : Yeah, you can't have behavioral issues at school if you're not even able to show up to school. And that's in and of itself such a testimony to all of the chaos that's happening outside of school that you do sometimes bring it in. Maybe you don't feel like you belong. You're not making friends because you know you smell bad because you don't have deodorants. You know, it's those little things that add up a ton over time.

Amy: Well, and I won't say that we don't have behaviors with our McKinney-Vento kids. There's obviously, you know, things that go on there, but, I don't know that it's any more than our other kids that experience trauma and don't have those supports in place as well. Those, families that are just like kind of a step away from being homeless. I do work for a school district where we have a large, percentage of our population that are low income, more low income than not. We try to put those supports in place for all of our kids. Bringing resources in for families. Some, you know, like I guess DHS for [example], is they have a mobile clinic that we have been able to bring in and that has helped with signing up our unaccompanied youth.

It helps with just our parents in general. They don't have to, go to the office and wait for those appointments. All of those things, that take that extra time. We try to bring those resources in. We have partnered with Light-A-Lamp and that is like one of my favorite things ever because they have these little mental health kids.

It's a present, right? These, these aren't just for McKinney kids, but for our other kids that are experiencing trauma too and they have things like a journal. They have snacks. They have just a number of things, little positive things, water bottles. Things to, to help these kids know that they matter and that somebody cares.

Joe: You had mentioned school-based housing case managers and just for the listeners, two years ago, Family Promise started partnering with school districts to put housing case managers inside school districts to work with them. Just wanted to find out how that relationship works between you as the school district employee and us as a nonprofit and our housing case managers and kind of who does what in those, in that relationship and what, what does that look like?

Amy: I'd like to say I absolutely love the school-based case workers that I'm currently working with. Kind of the process that goes with that is the kids, [which] are identified as the highest risk homeless kiddos and families. Those are the kids, that I usually refer because she can do a pretty intensive case management with these families because she's from finding employment to following all of those little steps that it takes to get them into housing and that follow-up piece as well.

She can work more intensive with those families where, you know, I have 306 families that I'm working with. That whole process has been great. We meet like once a month and really talk about those kids and then just a lot, a lot of communication. I know what's going on, what she's doing, what resources I've provided, what resources she's provided, it has been just an amazing partnership and something that I really value. It makes my job easier. I hope it's something that we can continue to have funding for.

Emma : What I love about the school-based case manager program essentially is every community across the nation has schools. We're really, really lucky to have that here in the United States, which means that every community has a hub where children that are at risk of housing instability or just instability in general have this staple place to come. If organizations like Family Promise can come alongside the work that's already being done by you and so many others and say, hey, you've got the birds eye view over everyone, how can we come in and really help in this specific area? 

For us, it's helping families get housing and then keep that housing. So, partnering with you and the birds-eye view and then having that expertise plugged in to continue to support the families that you know and get to see every day and all of that stuff feels like a real honor to us as well as a perfect alignment with our mission. What other things can organizations like ours do to support the work you're already doing in the United States? The schools?

Amy: I think prevention is the key because providing those resources and helping those families to be to stay in their housing and to be able to succeed there. Prevention is just the key in that all of the resources that a family can access the more the better. If they're able to get basic food benefits, if they're able to get medical, if they're able to get help with childcare, all of these things add up and it gives them those funds that they can put toward housing and paying other things as far as gas, things like that. That's one thing that I feel like we really lack in our community is that those funds for gas cards, things like that. A lot of local churches help with that, but as a community I think that's the one thing that I would really like to see more of.

Emma: I think that's a great example of a very practical thing. People always want to help, but they're not entirely sure how do I make sure that my help is helpful. Donating gas cards or going to a community center, a school in your community and saying, hey, you give out a lot of resources, what do you never get donations of?

Great. You never get gas cards. You never get baby diapers size five or six. That's one way we often see at Family Promise. Tampons has been another one that we just don't have enough of typically. Finding that specific thing in your community and then doing a drive for that, asking your people and then bringing it is a really practical application, I think for listeners who are like, how do I help? I want to help.

Amy: In our school district too, we do believe hugely in community and one of the things that I love that we do, a Thanksgiving dinner, a community Thanksgiving dinner and we do just that. We really put it out there for the staff. We don't ask our families to donate, but we leave these boxes in the schools and we have a list of items that are needed, feminine products, deodorant, shampoo, dog food, just all of those kinds of things. It's really cool how it's set up because we do it at our high school and set it all up in the library.

It's like a little store and you just get to go shopping and take what you need. Then we also do the dinner. We try to provide entertainment so our kids are involved in that and it's a great way to really connect with the community as a whole and it's just something that it's a great way to give back, but it's also we give so much from that ourselves when we see that.

Emma : Tell us about a story, a family that you on the roughest days go back to and say, okay, but I am making a difference and I see the success and I see these families thriving. Are you able to think of a story you're willing to share that has been such a heartwarming one for you?

Amy: I think there are lots of stories when families find housing, just celebrating that with families and I'll tell you about one family that I've worked with for the last two years. This family has had challenge after challenge after challenge. They lost their housing due to eviction. Mom has some substance issues.

CPS has been involved with this family. Phone gets turned off. This mom has always found a way to communicate with me whether they're couch surfing in court lane, whether they end up at a shelter, wherever they're at.

She's been able to find a way to connect and communicate and usually it's via email when her phone gets turned off. I look at her, and I see that huge resiliency in her. I see it in her kids as well. She has three kids. She has one in high school, one in middle school, and one in elementary school.

So, kind of span the whole situation. The oldest child, a lot of times when families are moving from place to place, there may not be room for everyone. So oldest kiddo gets separated. Has to go live with a friend. Middle school kid worried about mom, doesn't want to leave her. Mom's got all of these mental health issues and so the kiddo's just afraid that she leaves mom that she doesn't know what she's going to come back to. The little one just really, really always was consistent no matter where they ended up.

This kiddo was at school. We provided that transportation connected to our FAST counselor. FAST counselors are in our schools. That's another partnership that we do have with the community agency through behavioral health, Frontier Behavioral Health. There were times where her phone was turned off so she wasn't able to communicate with that FAST counselor.

So I was that conduct as well. But this mom is just amazingly resilient. I just feel like that's a success. I feel like all three of those kids are succeeding at different levels. The family may not be all intact right now, but I feel like we have, as the school district, that we have met those needs of that family at just different levels.

Emma : Yeah, you describe what success is. Success is the kids feel stable enough to contribute and to experience learning in schools. Maybe it's not the band-aid one size fits all and everyone has this twinkly life where they're now in this four bedroom apartment and everybody's happy.

Right? That could be a success, but to center it on the kid, what does the kid need? Kid needs to have a stable place where they're able to learn. And now they have that and they're learning. That's a huge success.

Joe: We had a family this past year where, and it's similar to some of the things you've talked about, where there's kids that are actually caring for the parents. And so we had a family this past year. Mom was in mental health crisis and the youngest son who was 17, his older brother also had learning disabilities, things like that.

So really the 17-year-old was the guardian of the family, was the responsible one of the family while also going to school. I remember they had slept in the car and it was freezing that night and I saw him in the parking lot the next morning and this is of our emergency shelter and just had him come in and wanted to talk to them. I just remember him [and his] mom went to the restroom and he just started crying and just said, you know, well you just give me a hug. It was this moment where you saw the weight of all the responsibility on these kids trying to care for a situation that is, they're not meant to do that, but that's the situation that they're in. My question to you with that is, you know, you're seeing kids like this often that are kind of holding families together or the ones that are caring for younger siblings or even their parents. What types of things could the community do to come alongside those kids and provide through the school district or through somebody else that's not currently happening or that could happen in a much larger way?

Amy: I think mentoring is huge. It's just, I really believe in mentoring programs and I just, I mean if you have somebody that is able to provide that to a child for that sense of belonging, I feel like is the most important thing that we can ever do for a kid if they feel like they belong, if they feel like, you know, somebody cares, they're going to want to be at school, they're going to be wanting to connect. We have an unaccompanied youth right now and I'm so, so proud of this, you know. She is on her own and she has been for quite some time. She is living with her dad. Dad kicked her out. He's got some huge substance issues and she is somebody that like looked after her brother, looked after things like that but then they got separated. Brother went to another household, CPS of course is involved. This kiddo though, right now she's in the process of filing a chance petition. She went to live with mom.

Joe: What exactly is the chance petition?

Amy: Child in need of services. Okay. And there were some issues as far as truancy goes. We created that sense of belonging for her. She went to state and track and she's two years in a row.

She really reaches out via email. I need this. I need that. She works really well with our counselors and she's always just, thank you, thank you, thank you. I'm sorry I haven't contacted you. Those kinds of things. And I think that she's an amazing kid. I think she's very resilient and she's going to do great wherever she goes.

Joe: How does mentoring impact kids and how can that, how can people get involved in that more in your district or in the community, wherever they're at?

Amy: I think anybody can be a mentor. Our coaches are mentors. Our teachers are mentors when I think about your own childhood, and I think of those people that were there to support me through hard times. Those people that, and they, you know, their teachers, their coaches, their community members, they’re in churches, they're just, so many ways in our community to volunteer. It's pretty simple, I think, just being there for kids, having somebody to just listen. That makes a whole world of difference. It doesn't have to be anything huge or elaborate or, you know, it's just kids, kids want you to show up for them.

Joe: Yeah.

Joe: I just want to do a shout out. If you're listening from Spokane, from the Spokane area, Launch Northwest has a program called Empower which partners with communities and schools and big brothers and sisters, other mentoring programs as well as colleges to provide mentors to high school students. And that's actually how we piloted the school-based case management is in partnership with Empower.

If you're in this area, that is something that you can get involved in and be part of. I want to shift gears real quick, and this may be one of the things that we've mentioned in other podcasts is the movement of homelessness and how homelessness historically was rural to urban. And then in around the year 2000, it started moving from urban to suburban. And so we're seeing this movement of homeless families out into the suburbs, away from downtowns, more and more. And your district has been one that has been greatly impacted with it's the one place where housing is being built. And you've seen large growth in homeless students over the past several years. And since you're not downtown, there's not resources that have been developed for 50, 100 years for folks that are experiencing homelessness. What types of things can those that are in suburban school districts and in areas, what types of things do you need that aren't there yet or haven't been built? What are the supports that are still missing for your area or that might be missing in suburban areas?

Amy: I think that we are fortunate that we are able to connect with those agencies in Spokane. And we have multiple agencies that, you know, that we partner with that do come into our schools, launch Northwest is amazing.

I'm working with our kids at the high school. There's a I've recently been certified in Hope to the Spokane Regional Health District. Launch Northwest is a big part of that and that hope framework of creating those positive experiences for kids. The PCEs, when we increase those versus ACEs, kids are going to do better, families are going to do better.

ACEs are adverse childhood experiences and how those carry over into adulthood and they impact them. They're just they're impactful in a lot of ways, substance use, mental health, employment, education. PCEs are positive childhood experiences. And so each time that we that we just make those deposits into kids, and they're feeling that that sense of belonging, that engagement, that social emotional growth, all of those things that that increases their chances and decreases the mental health, it decreases their likelihood of substance use of incarceration. It helps with our test scores. If you have if you have teachers that you know that you can trust as a student that you can go to and share what's going on and so forth and have that support. One of the things that we have adopted at our high school is that we really try to focus on every single child, every single student that is in our high schools having a safe person to go to. So that can be your principal, that can be your teachers, that can be your coaches, that could be who's serving you lunch. And the kitchen custodians, I mean, a bus driver. We really just want to find a way for a kid to connect with any adults. We want them to connect with multiple adults, but I think at least having that one safe adult is something that that's really important.

Joe: I really like that thought of the positive childhood experiences and focusing on what's right rather than just focusing on the adverse childhood experiences and what's wrong. And it reminds me of years ago, my spouse at the time and I, we did the ACEs test.

And it's 10 questions and you go through it and I can't remember I was a five or something on it, but she was a 10. And then you go from that and you look at like the studies will tell you well, if you have this many ACEs, then you're basically going to die younger from these horrible things and all these, you know, really bad, really bad kind of scary statistics because it was a health study originally. And that's why it was designed. It was actually an obesity study that created these adverse childhood experiences that came out of that.

Emma : And if you want to know more about it, go listen to our ACEs podcast episode, Total Shameless Plug. Carry on, Joe.

Joe: Yes, go listen to that one.

Joe: But we were left with not a really good like okay, what do we do now because this sounds terrible. And so I love that idea of okay, let's focus on the positive childhood experiences as well. These are some determining factors, but these are also important determining factors. And how can we improve those on the positive childhood experiences? And so just love that, that thought, especially coming out of my own experience.

Amy: And I think that is really important to focus on what we can do, right, and offer those supports in place. One of the things too that that we look at is not doing everything for them, still holding those kids accountable.

Yes, they're experiencing housing instability, but they still need to be held to those standards as well. I think that the same as for parents, a lot of times we'll try to make excuses and that, you know, okay, well, this is what's going on. So, you know, it's okay for this to happen or this is a stressful event. So, we're going to let this kid slide. I think that we do a kids a disservice. If we do that, I think that we just need to look at that and how can we support? How can we support and make you successful? I am part of the community attendance review board as well. And that's how we start off our discussions. And we really want that to be a positive experience. Yes, you're telling the experiencing, you know, truancy, but what's going on? And what supports can we bring into place to support that and be successful?

Joe: So, not excusing it, but what supports can help solve that situation and how do we get to that is kind of the focus there.

Amy: Right. Obviously, we have to start with Maslow's hierarchy of needs and make sure those just basic things are met before you can get to where you can even learn.

Joe: Right.

Amy: A lot of times kids come to school and they're not able to focus. Their minds are elsewhere. And a lot of times with trauma, it may look like ADHD because they're everywhere and fight or flight response and little things are triggered with that. But really, it's a trauma response.

Emma: As we wrap up our episode and kind of move towards what do I do from here? I've heard a number of different ways that people could get involved. Everything from a very specific, you start a conversation with a school near you.

Go and ask, Hey, how can I be involved? You need, you know, donations for Thanksgiving dinner. Do you need gas cards?

Do you need, you know, a safe person that can pass a background check? I assume in the classroom, you know, what can I do to help? So start that conversation. And then also knowing your neighbors. We go back to that a lot on this podcast of it's a community effort to keep the community stable. And that starts with knowing, Hey, do you need a little extra help?

Just that mindset of if I see something that I can do something about, I'm going to reach out and ask and help and be a part of caring for and keeping an eye on my community. That does make a big difference. It's a huge protective factor. It's a huge one of those positive experience replacers. Would you add anything else to things that we can do right now?

Amy: I think it's a if not me, then who if I can't provide those services, who can? And just like you said, just reaching out and saying, What do you need?

Do you need help? It's huge. It can create that sense of somebody cares. Even if I don't need that help, at least somebody asked somebody cares enough to be there for me. Yeah.

Emma: When I suppose to on the foot side, if you need help asking, don't necessarily wait for someone to ask you. It's okay to go and say, Hey, I am not I mean, I had another friend in my life reach out this week and say, Emma, I broke my foot.

Can you come take my dog for a walk? Like and I looked at that as also an equal part of participating in the belonging that a community is. It's yes, asking for help and offering help and being willing to be on either side, depending on your situation as it changes.

Joe: Yeah, I think the other thing that you had mentioned was mentoring and actually building relationships with kids and providing opportunities for them to have a positive caring relationship with somebody that's not required to be there, I think is really important and has been proven to be super successful at stemming all kinds of adverse results of childhood experiences. And so definitely want to encourage the listeners to look into mentoring, look into that in your area. I know that communities and schools across the country, they have mentoring programs, whether it's big sisters, or just the school districts themselves have a lot of programming where you can engage with children that are at risk of all kinds of different things or just need another person there. And I think if most of us look back on our own experiences, we can point to somebody that wasn't a parent, that wasn't a teacher that made a difference in our lives, somebody that didn't have to be there, but was, you could be that for a child in this next generation. And so just want to encourage the listeners in that as we are wrapping up here.

Amy: Well, and I would say that parents need that too. A lot of parents, they've, they came from those traumatic backgrounds, you know, kids don't come with the manual, right? They're repeating that those mistakes that their parents made because we learned how to be a parent from our parents, right? Just coming alongside of those parents and, and, and being that mentor, being that role model, we can do everything right with these kids in the schools.

But the reality is they go home. And so supporting those parents is key. Helping them to feel that sense of belonging, inviting them into, to events. One of our elementary schools this past spring did, they looked at population of their school and, how can we acknowledge different people's beliefs and customs?

And they did a multicultural night, finding out who your community is, and then what is it that, that they need? How can, how can we help build those connections? How did parents connect with each other? And how can they be a resource for each other? And I think by providing those opportunities and those events, parents meet other parents.

And how can I help? And next door neighbor, let's share childcare, those kinds of things. Parents can be resources together and for each other as well. It doesn't have to be necessarily just the student. It, we just really need to support those parents as well.

Emma: This episode has given me a lot of hope for the reality that homelessness, housing and stability is solvable, which is something we believe for a long time here at Family Promise. But Amy, the work you and your team do is such a testament to that. So, thank you. Thank you for being a part of the safety net. And thank you to everybody else that has stepped in in various ways to mentor kids and parents and one another and fellow leaders. It is all of us taking care of each other that changes things truly for the future.

Amy: It takes a village, right? It takes a village to raise kids. It takes, takes a village to support parents, others in our community are elderly. So really, I believe it's all about community and creating that sense of belonging that, that engagement and that social growth.

Emma: Well, thank you so much for joining us for this conversation. Amy, if you listener enjoyed this episode and want to dive deeper into any of the topics discussed, please feel free to send us an email at podcast at familypromiseofspokane.org.

Any questions, any thoughts, any areas that you were like, oh my goodness, wait, I want to know more. All of that really helpful feedback, helping us craft a very helpful tool for you as a listener. Thank you to our producers, Gwen Griffith and Lucy Pearson, and Family Promise of Spokane Summer Interned Charis for all of your help and assistance with this episode. Lastly, a big thank you to you. Thank you for listening, for being willing to learn, and for always staying curious. Until next time, this has been On The Corner of Homelessness and.