::: First Things First - Karen Matson, educator - Interview

GoodLetter, May 16, 2002

Is there any way to end the cycle of homelessness? Says one ground-breaking school, it's by dedicating heart and soul to the children.

Dear GoodLetter readers,

We've all seen it. That huddled man in a dark doorway, struggling to keep warm with a threadbare blanket. The woman, looking far older than her years, standing at the intersection using a crumpled cardboard message to plead for the smallest token of help. These are the all-too-familiar images of the kind of abject poverty that persists in every town, city, and country around the world. Each year alone, it leaves as many as 3.5 million Americans, half a million Britons, half a million Australians, a quarter of a million Canadians -- just for starters -- without a place to call home.

But no matter what your perspective is on the circumstances that cause homelessness, it is striking that at any given moment, 30 million to 170 million of the world's homeless are children -- children facing profound social stigma, children without support or security, and, significantly, children without the benefit of a stable education. GoodThings recently spoke with Karen Matson of Seattle's First Place School about the extraordinary steps it is taking in the global effort to break poverty's destructive cycle by providing substantive opportunities for homeless children.

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GoodThings (GTS): First Place School opened in 1989. What was the inspiration?

Karen Matson (KM): At the time, it was Seattle Public School's policy that if you did not have a permanent address, you could not attend public school. So four women started a school in a church basement for homeless kids whose families were staying in shelters. Since then, the school has grown and moved a number of times, and here we are in a recently renovated former temple in order to accommodate our expanded program.

GTS: How many homeless families in the area around Seattle need essential services and how many are you reaching?

KM: It's said that there are 7,300 homeless individuals every night throughout King County (up from 6,500 in 2000). Women and children make up about a third of that number. We have room for 70 children in our school, so at any time, we're reaching at least that many. We'll reach about 160 children in the course of a year, and their family members -- so about 525 people will be impacted by First Place this year. Since 1989, we've reached about 4,000 homeless children and families.

GTS: How varied are the circumstances of the children at First Place?

KM: We have one family who lived in 11 different places in the 30 days they were with us. That's probably the worst-case scenario. And then we have seven units of transitional housing, which we administer with the Seattle Housing Authority, for families who are in a one-year intensive program. They're pretty stable. They know where they'll be for a year and that really gives the parents a chance to learn some skills. Whether it's job skills, budgeting skills, relationship skills, or substance-abuse education, we can really focus and help them take some steps. Then, as another example, we have one family here where the mother is a Somali refugee, and she has no income. As a refugee, she doesn't qualify for any state and federal funding. It's amazing how they doing it.

GTS: What is the cultural breakdown of the school?

KM: It's about 70 percent African American, but we're very mixed: Hispanic, African American, Native American, Caucasian.

GTS: Tell me about First Place School's Family Success Center.

KM: The Family Success Center is a new outreach program that helps families with children not enrolled at First Place who are dealing with family or educational crises. We have gone to public schools in our neighborhood to talk to the staff counseling person about the services we offer -- the case management, the access to resources, and tutoring. Each time, we'll say, "How many families or kids in your school do you think you could refer to us?" Each school has from 100 to 250 kids they could refer to us.

One example of someone we've reached through the Family Success Center is a middle-school girl who's 13 with a one-month-old baby. She came to us. The high schools have programs for unmarried mothers, but the middle schools do not. So we advocated for her -- to help her stay in her middle school classes, then find transportation and arrange for her to go to the high school for parenting classes, and also let her child be in the high school's daycare program.

At the same time, we're working with her parents. There's obviously something else going on, and the family needs support.

GTS: Talk a little bit about First Place School's comprehensive approach.

KM: We believe in "wrap-around" case management. When you're enrolled here, you get your own case manager. We help with basic clothing and food needs. We really enroll the whole family. We bring parents in for counseling and case management. We recognize that if a family is moving four times, 14 times in a month, that not having your math homework might not be that important.