What is the first word that comes to your mind when you think about college? Is it parties, lack of sleep, freedom, or stress. How about homelessness. Yes, homelessness. If you don’t it’s ok you are not alone. according to the Wisconsin Hope Lab 36% of university students and 51% of community college students are housing insecure, also 9% of university students and 12% of community college students are homeless. In this study they used the word Housing Insecurity which means the inability to pay rent or utilities or the need to move frequently it also sometimes includes homelessness (Wisconsin Hope Lab).
Being homeless or housing insecure can have many effects on a student such as lack of sleep, depression, Anxiety, Fear which leaves students suffering grades in school and causing students to ultimately drop out. So why are so many students suffering from housing insecurity? One the reasons being is that little people know about it, many people believe the stigma that college students receive large amounts of money to pay for school which is true but, what they do not know is that the money can only cover so much of it leaving most students having to pay for the rest of their tuition, books, supplies, transportation, food, and other bills. Most of the time students will pay other necessities first leaving what little they have left for housing which is not enough for rent. Another reason why there are many housing insecure students is because they don’t ask.
Students don’t ask because they are afraid of the embarrassment or afraid of being bullied. they don’t know that they can qualify for help, or because when they do ask colleges and government programs don’t believe them, and also, they have to go through an extensive process to be able to prove that there struggling for help.
Another reason for housing insecurity is that more jobs require college degrees meaning that there are more students who would normally not go to college are now going, most of them being in the lower economic classes. Although there are many reasons for college homelessness, there are also many ways of helping students. Many colleges have opened a shelter for there students, for example, U.C.L.A has opened shelter Called Students 4 Students The shelter mostly serves students from U.C.L.A. and Santa Monica College (Harris).
