More Than 20 Percent Of Students Are Homeless At Liberty High School In Chelsea: Report

CHELSEA, NY — More than 20 percent of students at the Liberty High School in Chelsea were homeless in the 2014-2015 school year, according to a new interactive map released Wednesday.

The Institute for Children, Poverty and Homelessness released a new map showing homelessness throughout the city. At Liberty High School for Newcomers, 98 of 466 students were homeless during the 2014-2015 school year, according to data analyzed by the institute. That means that about 21 percent of students at the school, which caters to non-English speaking immigrant students, were homeless that year. The school, located at 250 W 18th St., is one of more than 35 schools in Manhattan alone that had a homeless population of more than 20 percent that year.

The interactive map accompanies a report from the institute analyzing the state of student homelessness in New York City. The institute's findings city-wide are sobering: Of all students who attended a city public school in the 2014-2015 year, one of every eight had experienced homelessness within the last five years. In total, 82,000 students enrolled in New York City public schools in the 2014-15 school year were homeless. This analysis defines a homeless student as one without permanent housing, and includes students living in a shelter, unsheltered, doubled up or another temporary situation, according to the report.

The report emphasized the lasting impact that homelessness has on children's stability and learning progress. Homeless students were twice as likely to drop out of school as the average New York City student, according to the analysis. The problem in the Bronx is particularly acute: 20 percent of all homeless students in the city attended just two school district in the borough, according to the institute.

Homelessness has remained one of the most persistent problems in New York City, and the homeless population remains significantly larger than it was ten years ago. Mayor Bill de Blasio has named housing insecurity as among the city's most pressing problems.

You can explore other schools in New York City via the institute's interactive map here. The map does not include schools that had less than 10 students who were homeless, to protect students' privacy.

Image via Wikimedia Commons.