Who is homeless?

The Federal McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act defines children and youth who lack a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence as homeless. This includes children and youths who:

• share the housing of other persons due to loss of housing, economic hardship, or a similar reason (sometimes referred to as “doubled-up”);

• live in motels, hotels, trailer parks, or camping grounds due to lack of alternative adequate accommodations;

• live in emergency or transitional shelters;

• are abandoned in hospitals;

• have a primary nighttime residence that is a public or private place not designed for, or ordinarily used as, a regular sleeping accommodation for human beings;

• live in cars, parks, public spaces, abandoned buildings, substandard housing (e.g., housing that lacks any one of the fundamental utilities, does not have working a kitchen or plumbing, is overcrowded, or infested),  bus or train stations, or similar settings; and

• Migratory children who qualify as homeless because they are living in circumstances described above.

• Unaccompanied youth who qualify as homeless because they are living in circumstances described above.

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Students whose living situations meet this definition have educational rights and are eligible to receive services under the McKinney-Vento Act.