OXFORD — Almost half of the 43 identified homeless students in the Oxford Hills School District are elementary school-age students, according to school officials.

A total of 17 high school, four middle school and 21 kindergarten through grade six elementary students have been identified by the district as being homeless.

“(I’m) not sure there are ‘so many’ (elementary school homeless students) per se,” said Assistant Superintendent Patrick Hartnett, the district liaison for homeless students, when asked why the large number of younger homeless students.

Hartnett said one factor may be that there is a seven-year window to be identified homeless at the elementary level as oppossed to two years at the middle school and four years at the high school, he said.

Homeless students are defined as those who are unaccompanied (they may have been abandoned, kicked out of their home or run away); abandoned in hospitals; awaiting foster care; have a nighttime residence that is a public or private place but not ordinarily used as regular sleeping accomondations; those living in cars, parks and public places; and students who “couch surf” (those who sleep at a different houses nightly).

“Students are very clear saying, ‘I’m on my own, and I need help,'” Hartnett said of unaccompanied students who seek out his help.

Hartnett presented an overview of the homeless situation in the school district to the Board of Directors at its Monday meeting.

Homeless liaisons are assigned at every school district in Maine, which has about 1,350 homeless students, he said. The role of the homeless liaison is defined by the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, which was incorporated into the No Child Left Behind Act. It says in part that all homeless students, whether accompanied or not, have the same right to remain in their school of origin, get transportation back and forth to school and immediately be enrolled in a new school serving the area in which the homeless student lives.

“Concentrating on homework is really hard when you don’t know where you’ll be sleeping that night,” said Hartnett, whose job is to identify homeless students and make sure they are educated.

Overall, of the 43 children identified as homeless in the Oxford Hills School District, 23 are in a doubled-up situation (where families are living with others), 13 are in shelters, five are in motels or hotels and two are unsheltered. There remains an unknown number of potential other homeless children in the school district, according to Hartnett at the Board of Director’s meeting

Hartnett said his job is to ensure that all homeless students receive educational services. It is a job that he said is not always easy. Enrollment requirements, such as residency, school records, immunization, legal guardianship, lack of access to programs, transportation, clothes, school supplies, poor health and other issues all play a role in the sometimes difficult effort to place a homeless student in to an educational program, Hartnett said.

“Having records is key,” he said of the issue that often arises when a child is not accompanied by a guardian or parent or for a family who may have lost all their records in a fire or other types of situations.

Homeless students do have the right to remain in their school of origin until the end of the academic year if it is in their “best interest,” but Hartnett said issues of transportation sometimes do not make that feasible. For example, if a student is living in West Paris but wants to finish the school year out in Calais, that would not be feasible.

“In rural Maine sometimes we lose a sense of homelessness, but it affects us as well,” Hartnett said.

ldixon@sunjournal.com

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