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Zulema Cuevas

Prof. Fischer

Writing 39C

20 November 2015

Solving the Educational Effects of Child Poverty Through the Expansion of Housing Subsidies

Marcell is a 12-year old boy living in Camden, New Jersey with his grandmother. With the minimal government support she receives, she is struggling to provide the basic needs for Marcell. Because his grandmother can not afford to provide him with a safer environment, he is surrounded by high levels of crime, unemployment, and school dropout rates (Coen). Marcell is one of the astounding 15.5 million children living in poverty today (Bureau 14). According to the U.S. Census Bureau, this number has remained stagnant for the past four years, meaning that there has been no change in the level of child poverty. Studies such as the one conducted by Sum and Fogg (1991) demonstrate the relationship between living in poverty and low academic performance (Lacour and Tissington 522). Due to the toxic stressors that are paired with living in poverty, the child is susceptible to brain development issues. Because of these brain development issues, they have an academic disadvantage in comparison to their affluent peers.  Child poverty is detrimental to their educational achievement and requires urgent attention. Advocacy groups, such as The Children’s Defense Fund, hope to aid this problem through approaching poverty as a whole by increasing the minimum wage. As a direct influence to the child’s education, The Center for the Study of Social Policy suggested the alternative approach of increasing funding for Head Start Programs. Although these solutions will contribute to solving the problem, the Child Defense Fund argues that the expansion of housing subsidies will be the most beneficial solution to a child’s education. Housing costs are the heaviest economic burden of a family living in poverty, and the increase in funding for housing voucher programs is the best solution because it will provide the child with a better educational environment and also ultimately reduce the poverty rate.

Child Poverty is a persistent issue that is detrimental to a child’s brain development and thus, impedes a child from academically succeeding. There is no doubt that child poverty is a problem in America (“Ending Child Poverty Now”). In fact, America has the second highest poverty rate among industrialized nations like Europe, Japan, and Canada. According to the Child Defense Fund, “more than 1 in 5 children under age 5 [are] living in poverty during the years of rapid brain development” (“Ending Child Poverty Now”).  In comparison to other age groups, Children under the age of 18 have the highest rate of poverty.  The field study of Epigenetics provides a biological interpretation on the effects of poverty on a child’s brain development (Chang). The several environmental stressors that a child living in poverty experiences for a prolonged period time result in these brain development issues. According to an article from the Center on Developing Childat Harvard University, a child suffers with toxic stress when they suffer with prolonged adversity for long period of times, namely “accumulated economic burdens of economic hardship”. Toxic stress is known to increase stress-related diseases because it disrupts the brain development. Based on environmental factors, certain genes can be turned on and off, thus, the several environmental stressors of child poverty result in cognitive issues that impair the learning process. According to a report from a non-profit organization that helps disadvantaged students, The Annie E. Casey Foundation, “Children who read proficiently by the end of third grade are more likely to graduate from high school and to be economically successful in adulthood” (Early Reading Proficiency 1). However, the report further explains that children living in poverty are less likely to read proficiently. In fact, 80 percent of children living in poverty are below the proficiency in reading. Over the past decade, the gap between children living in poverty and their affluent peers increased by 20 percent in nearly every state. (Early Reading Proficiency 2). The detrimental outcomes of child poverty should not impede a child’s success in school. Knowledge is power, and the nation is wasting massive human potential by not helping these children have an equal opportunity at achieving in school.

Past efforts to alleviate the problem highlight that child poverty is not an easy problem to solve. In 1964, a shocking 22% of America’s population were living in poverty. Consequently, President Lyndon B. Johnson decided to call a “War on Poverty” in order to find a solution to this outbreak (Crooks 2). This initiated interest among researchers to understand if there was a link between malnutrition and mental performance. Their research found that malnutrition “impaired cognition by structurally altering the brain” (Brown 1).These findings indicated the urgency to help disadvantaged children suffering because of economic struggles. Subsequently, social programs that provided families with nutritional and educational benefits were instilled to alleviate the future of many children that were being deprived of food. The Food Stamp Act of 1964 aimed to provide “improved levels of nutrition among low-income households” (The Food Stamp Act 1964). In 1964, Head Start was another federal program that received grants. This program aimed to psychologically support low-income children through an eight week summer program. At last, the poverty rate drastically decreased from 22.1% to 12.16% between the years of 1960 and 1970 (Crooks 2). Unfortunately, the programs to solve America’s problem were only momentarily successful. In 1975, the poverty rate began to rise once again.  However, this time around, poverty began to target America’s children.  According to Poverties.org, a website dedicated to the publication of social research, the change in the traditional family structure was at fault for the rise. Single mothers became increasingly popular, in fact, “the birth rate for single mothers in 2007 was 80 percent higher than it was in 1980” (Huffington). This means that only one person has the stressful burden of ensuring basic needs and attention are given to the child. The poverty rate for children was 15.1%  in 1975 (Crooks 2). Fast forward 40 years, today there are a whopping 21.1% of children under 18 living in poverty (Bureau 14). The efforts of America were not failures because they taught society that root causes of poverty need to be targeted in order to successfully implement anti-poverty programs.

In order to combat the war on poverty, numerous organizations have suggested that increasing the funding for Head Start Programs would directly help a child’s education. The Center for the Study of Social Policy advocates the improvement of vulnerable children to policy makers. This organization believes that Head Start programs would be a good investment because evidence reveals that there is a positive impact on children’s literacy and language (“Reducing Child Poverty” 19). The purpose of Head Start is to “promote school readiness of low income children  by enhancing their cognitive, social, and emotional development” (Ramey and Ramey). Over the years this program initiated in 1964 developed into more than just an 8 week program but has not made much of an impact because of the lack of resources. Proponents of this solution include a Child and Family studies Professor Susan H. Mayer from Georgetown University and Director of Child and Family studies at Georgetown university, Craig Ramey. In their research on the impact of Head Start on child poverty they discuss that providing the positive learning environment are essential to school readiness will allow for a child to advance in their academic future (Ramey and Ramey). In spite of that, a study published on the Congressional Digest suggests that the benefits of Early educational programs do not have long lasting educational benefits (“Head Start Impact Study). Clearly, the opposing research findings imply the lack of research to prove that Head Start positively influences a child’s academic outcome. Although education is imperative, this solution alone will not make an extensive difference in the child’s academic success because there are several factors that play a role on how much a child benefits from this program. There is a lack of enrollment of Head Start among children living in poverty because the parent is not aware of the benefits. In 2014 only four percent of eligible children were enrolled in Head Start programs  (Child Trends Databank). The alternative approach to this solution could be to increase education amongst parents but still this solution does aid a child’s academic success to the fullest extent.

Unlike Head Start programs that have unreliable impacts on the problem, the Children’s Defense Fund argues that raising the minimum wage would immediately solve the overall problem of child poverty but fail to take into account the solution’s impact on society. The Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) is a non profit organization that researches to develop appropriate policies and programs that advocate the well-being of children. This advocacy group is proposing for the  minimum wage to increase to $10.10. The minimum wage increase would help provide families with enough to meet their basic needs. The CDF argues that this would evidently lower the poverty rate by 4 percent which would result in about 400,000 children moved out of poverty. This increase would help a family stress less financially. However, in the same report published by the Children’s Defense Fund they offer insight to the larger scale impacts of the minimum wage increase. The minimum wage would lead to job losses and increased taxes. (“Ending Child Poverty Now”). This solution does provide some relief but does not provide the fullest amount of benefits for the child’s education. According to an article published on The Guardian, the increase in minimum wage would place them above the Supplemental Poverty Measure. This means that the few extra dollars that families would be receiving would cut them from receiving benefits like food stamps. Simply put, “The higher the minimum wage gets, the less in benefits the family is eligible to receive” (Kasperkevic).  This solution will inevitably bring more harm than good and thus it is important to look at other options.

Although these solutions do positively impact the poverty rate, increasing the funding for housing subsidies is the most beneficial solution that critics have proposed because it will provide the child with a less stressful environment which ensures a better educational setting. The increase in funding will allow to remove the economic burden of housing for families living in poverty. According to the Child Defense Fund, Increasing housing subsidies would reduce the poverty rate by 20.8%. (Child Defense Fund). The Child Defense Fund is a non-profit advocacy program that aims to lift children out of poverty. The reason that increasing  affordable housing would contribute largely is because of the huge economic burden that housing is for families living in poverty. According to the Institute for Research and Poverty, “Between 1991 and 2013, the percentage of renter households in America dedicating under 30 percent of their income to housing costs fell from 54 percent to 43 percent” (Desmond). However, the percentage of people dedicating more than half of their paycheck to rent costs rose from 21% to 30%  within this time frame (Desmond). This means that parents are constantly being pressured to ensure their paycheck will be able to support a roof over their head and food on the table. This insecurity would be alleviated through the availability of affordable housing therefore, preventing a child from being exposed to detrimental impacts. Also the extra money saved could be used towards the child’s school, food, or any necessary medical care. Unlike the other solutions, this solution offers alleviation to the academic impacts of child poverty and the overall problem. A Child’s education should not be jeopardized because of the economic burden of housing.

Housing subsidies have been proven to positively impact a child’s educational outcome but the current status of funding has not allowed to alleviate the poverty rate to it’s fullest potential.  According to Institute for Research on Poverty, “Two-thirds of poor renters today do not benefit from federal housing programs” (Desmond 2). Clearly the demand for affordable housing does not meet the supply. The United States department Housing and Urban Development are responsible for the programs, section 8 and public housing, that provide relief of the housing payment burden. The main difference between these two programs is that Section 8 requires the use of a voucher at a rental unit where the landlord agrees to accept the program, whereas, public housing consists of properties managed by local housing authorities. However, both housing programs have long waiting lists that leave families living in inadequate housing for longer periods of time. According to the National Center for Children in Poverty, the average wait time for families to receive public housing is 10 months. The longest waiting period for public housing is 33 months. (Aratani, Chau, Wright, and Addy 7).  As if this was not a long waiting period already, the average waiting period for Section 8 vouchers is 38 months (“Why Are People Homeless?”). This is an absurd amount of time for a child to be living in an unstable environment and requires an adjustment. The increase in affordable housing would allow for the child to experience a safe environment that promotes a healthy lifestyle and will ultimately promote academic success.

The Pathways out of Poverty Act of 2015 is another bill that challenges the educational impact of child poverty by confronting several aspects of poverty. Representative Barbara Lee from California introduced the bill H.R. 2721 to the House in October of 2015. The bill aims “to strengthen and expand proven anti-poverty programs and initiatives” (H.R.272). This bill is divided into 6 Divisions: Education, Housing, Nutrition, Job Training, Taxes, and Miscellaneous.  Division A: Education promotes access to early educational programs by funding higher education among teachers and principals, maintain the facilities, and allow for more children to participate. This section of the bill also discusses the funding of Pell Grants for Higher Education. Division B: Housing, discusses the use of mortgage interest savings for affordable housing programs. This bill also analyzes the importance of nutrition in a child and promotes their health through the advocacy for funding the TANF program (a program that promotes prenatal responsibility). The bill also takes into consideration the influence that supporting parents through the increase of unemployment benefits and the expansion of Earned Income Tax Credit has on the child poverty levels. This bill seeks to approach the overall problem of poverty but takes into consideration the several factors that impact a child’s psychological well being.

A separate bill proposes to solve the problem by establishing a national plan within 20 years but does not take into consideration the length and research already made by several advocacy groups. Senator Robert P. Casey from Pennsylvania introduced an alternative bill, S.2224, that approaches the overall poverty problem by aiming to “establish..the Federal Interagency Working Group on Reducing Child Poverty to develop a national strategy to eliminate child poverty in the United States, and for other purposes” (S.2224). This bill seeks to reduce the poverty rate in 20 years through research, however, there has been a significant amount of research made on the programs that would benefit the child’s education. Twenty years is also a substantial amount of time for children to be at risk of psychological issues. The vast resources that this proposed bill would use upon a lengthy 20 years, is in effect an unnecessary cost that can be substituted by bills like the “Pathways out of Poverty” that already implements a descriptive and incremental change that can solve problems more effectively.

The Pathways out of Poverty Act of 2015 would be the best solution because it includes the support of grants for housing subsidies that would that would provide an environment that promotes academic success. Division B of bill H.R.2721 is especially significant in influencing the academic success of a child because it supports the increase in housing subsidies. The removal of a huge economic stressor would alleviate the parent and child from unnecessary stress would promote a better lifestyle. This would then increase the amount of attention a parent gives a child. According to a study made by the National Survey of America’s Families, children living in unaffordable housing experience having health problems and an increasing rate of behavior problems (Aratani, Chau, Wright, and Addy  6). This bill reveals their findings that “there are only 30 affordable units for every 100 families” (H.R 2721) to remind the reader of the urgency for this solution.It is important to understand that the Pathways Out of Poverty Act is positively changing the environment that the child is developing in and thus preventing the toxic stressors from impeding their educational achievements.

Child poverty’s malice effects on academic achievement have demanded the urgency to find a solution. Several advocacy groups have suggested alternative methods but fail to take into account preventive methods. Increasing funding for housing subsidies is the best solution to prevent children from being exposed to prolonged toxic stressors related to housing insecurities that result in low academic performance. That is why the Pathways out of Poverty Act is an essential piece of legislation that must be passed.  Child poverty has a direct correlation to child education, when children are not given the opportunity to thrive and tools to succeed it fuels a perpetual loop of poverty. As cliche as the saying goes, children are the future and it is imperative that they are given the equal chance to receive a proper education and chance to succeed.