Making the Case Issue #2 focuses on extra-curricular activities.
“Football is the anchor, but how can he continue to attend the same school as homelessness moves them from place to place? How can he be eligible to play football if he’s not residing in the district? How can he pay for football equipment and fees? How will he get to school, to practice, and to games? Where will this family live?”
Making the Case: Legal Language to Support Students – Extracurricular Activities
This series describes real students’ situations, and provides tips for how to make the legal case for providing the supports that the student needs.
THE STUDENT
The parent was driving her son an hour to football practice. Events in the summer caused the family to lose their home. They had been staying with a relative. Then the relative lost her home, and they didn’t know where they were going to sleep. The fallback plan was the car. But she still took him to football practice. It was the anchor of their life at the moment. As their lives swirled around them, dire homelessness, loss of income, loss of job, evictions, hunger, fear of the future…football was the anchor.
Football is the anchor, but how can he continue to attend the same school as homelessness moves them from place to place? How can he be eligible to play football if he’s not residing in the district? How can he pay for football equipment and fees? How will he get to school, to practice, and to games? Where will this family live?
MAKING THE CASE
What is some legal language to help the liaison support this student?