The Golden Ticket: Putting College Within Homeless Youths’ Reach

Jessica McCormick never doubted she was going to college.

Not when she ran away from a violent home the summer before her senior year. Not when she bounced among the houses of friends and extended family. Not when, more than once, she wound up living on the streets of her hometown, Grand Rapids, MI, for several weeks.

Despite everything, McCormick got good grades, worked in her high school’s main office, sent off her college application and graduated. In June 2010, she received an acceptance letter from Aquinas College, a liberal arts school in Grand Rapids. And she realized she couldn’t afford to go.

On average, higher education boosts people’s lifetime earnings compared to having a high school-level diploma or less. For unaccompanied youth like McCormick, who have no fixed residence or family support, “It’s the door out of not being able to get a job, not being able to support yourself,” she says—in other words, a first step toward economic independence, a meaningful career and overall self-sufficiency.  

But unaccompanied young people face many hurdles to going to college, say McCormick and Barbara Duffield, policy director of the National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth. Those obstacles include not having the money for deposits and fees, lack of knowledge about their rights and the benefits they may be eligible for, daunting paperwork, and lack of support as they attempt to navigate the higher education system on their own. For example, many youth may not know that the Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2008 expanded the definition of “independent students” eligible to apply for financial aid without a parent or guardian’s approval or financial records. Now that category includes unaccompanied homeless youth and foster youth.

“The policies are in place, but the implementation over the past three years has been rocky,” Duffield says.

Duffield says relationship-building and partnerships among  social services providers, state and school district homelessness liaisons, state departments of education, and colleges and universities will be key to ensuring that more unaccompanied young people go to college—and graduate. A few states, like Colorado and North Carolina, have implemented such statewide partnerships to smooth the way for homeless and foster youth in higher education.

But Duffield says, “You don’t need to wait for a state network to start making it happen locally.” She says youth-serving organizations can identify the nearby colleges their youth are most interested in attending, then work with each institution’s financial aid, admissions and student affairs offices to streamline the process for admitting and supporting homeless students.

In McCormick’s case, her social workers at Arbor Circle, a Grand Rapids social services nonprofit, jumped in to help. “They were basically saying, ‘That’s the golden ticket in your hand,’” McCormick says. “’Don’t throw it out.’” Arbor staff worked with the college’s administrators, got McCormick financial aid, and arranged for her to start living on campus even before the semester started.

Now 20 and a rising junior majoring in sociology and community leadership, McCormick has started an organization, called Hope House, that will support unaccompanied youth at her college by offering life-skills training, tutoring, mentoring, and other services and by acting as a liaison to the college’s administration.

“In my ideal world,” she says, “every homeless youth would have a person or family member who would encourage them and help them find their golden ticket.”

Here are some steps you can take to help youth in your program make the leap to higher education:

Show them it’s within reach. Duffield says unlike Jessica McCormick, many unaccompanied high-school-age youth view college as an unattainable goal. “They need to know as early as possible that despite their family situation, despite their financial situation, they can get financial aid,” she says.

In addition, touring local college campuses can demystify college for youth and put them in the mindset of applying. Work with the admissions office or recruiters to set up appointments and make sure college staff understand the situations and needs of unaccompanied youth.

Simplify the paperwork. Applying to college involves a lot of forms. Unaccompanied students need help verifying their independent status for the Federal Application for Student Aid, or FAFSA, proving their residence to qualify for in-state tuition at state institutions, filling out application and financial aid forms, and writing college essays.

McCormick advises adults, “Instead of handing youth a packet and asking them to fill it, walk kids through it. … We’re young adults, but we’re not mini-adults. We don’t understand everything yet.”

Among NAEHCY’s higher education resources is a brief on helping unaccompanied youth apply for financial aid. Youth workers can enlist high school counselors and college admissions and financial aid staff to help with these steps.

Deal with fees and deposits. Students with economic need can have the fees waived for the two common standardized tests, the SAT and ACT. Some colleges, including Pensacola State College in Florida, waive application fees for students who qualify for the test-fee waivers. If colleges don’t have standard policies, talk to their admissions office on students’ behalf.

Young people may also need housing deposits to hold their college spaces or dorm rooms. You can help them plan to save, negotiate a waiver from their college, or locate sources of funding.

Put them in good hands. As youth workers know, unaccompanied youth often need more intense academic, mental health and other support. Many need help with study skills, time management and decision making, and don’t know who to ask.

Jeff Benjamin, a recruiter at Pensacola State, recently gave a college tour to about 15 homeless students from the Santa Rosa County School district. “On the tour, I introduced them to at least five people they need to know,” he says, including staff in admissions, financial aid, academic advising, student affairs and the career center.

You can also make sure youth know where to find the campus tutoring center, mental health professionals and other support services.

Set them up with housing for school breaks. For McCormick, vacation housing is still a problem. This summer, she had two months of on-campus housing, which she paid for with a stipend from Arbor Circle and her own savings from an internship with the Grand Rapids Area Coalition to End Homelessness. The rest of the summer she crashed in the living room of a friend.

Some colleges make housing available to international students during breaks, and McCormick says negotiating spaces for homeless students may be an option. Colleges may not know that they can use federal student support services funds to pay for temporary housing for unaccompanied youth during breaks, so talk to the student affairs office and the housing office to work something out.