It’s an effort to address homelessness experienced by Connecticut public school students.
According to the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving, that included more than 5,600 students experiencing homelessness at points during the 2023-24 school year.
That number is a 63 percent increase since 2021, and 85 percent of those were students of color, 26 percent had disabilities, and 29 percent were English language learners, according to the foundation.
To help address this, the foundation has awarded a $142,725 grant to the nonprofit RE!NSTITUTE for a planning effort “to support the Greater Hartford region’s education and homeless response system.”
“The team at RE!NSTITUTE are excited to be working once again in Connecticut, where we have previously facilitated youth-focused 100-Day Challenges which have housed 395 people,” said RE!NSTITUTE CEO, Sarah Robens.
“Our focus on enabling cross-system collaboration will be at the fore of this Challenge, as we bring together a team of people from relevant sectors, including education, housing, and employment, to make significant change to young people within a 100-Days, through the creation and testing of innovations that will change how the system works. We are looking forward to getting going and appreciate the interest and support of this work from Governor Ned Lamont, and the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving.”
According to the foundation, the 100-Day Challenge aims supports the “education, homeless response, and employment support systems in the Greater Hartford CAN geographic area to leverage local resources and connect more students and families to housing and employment services.”
This means working toward “closer collaboration between service providers,” so that families are housed “sooner and more efficiently.”
The Greater Hartford CAN area includes 17 school districts, representing 10 percent of the state’s public-school districts overall, according to the foundation.
The foundation said the homelessness and housing instability brings “significant educational challenges” for students and educators, and addressing it can make a “significant impact on improving educational outcomes for these students.”
“The Hartford Foundation remains committed to ensuring that all students can reach their full potential by eliminating barriers to their success,” Hartford Foundation President and CEO Jay Williams said in a statement. “The Foundation is proud to support this effort to foster greater collaboration between educators, homelessness and housing providers, and other stakeholders. By building on the work that local school districts and community providers are already doing, we can ensure that students and their families have access to stable, secure housing and young people can focus on being successful in the classroom.”
The foundation noted the project fits with its strategic priority of “increasing stable education and employment opportunities for Black and Latine adults and youth” in the region, who “face barriers to employment. It will “work to ensure that students experiencing homelessness can remain present and engaged in school, improve educational outcomes by addressing the overrepresentation of marginalized students in housing instability, and strengthening cross-sector collaboration to enhance support systems and public awareness of available programming.”
The project also will collaborate with the Connecticut Department of Education on behalf of the Governor’s Kids Cabinet.
The foundation also noted that its grant would allow RE!NSTITUTE to access McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act resources “as well as services and expertise of Greater Hartford Coordinated Access Network to connect more students and families to housing and resources in school districts and communities.”
According to the foundation, the Greater Hartford CAN has reported nearly 900 students experiencing homelessness, which represents about 16 percent of all students experiencing homelessness in Connecticut.
“Our administration’s Kids Cabinet has made responding to youth homelessness a top priority because students facing homelessness deserve our support to get a good education,” Lamont said in a statement.
“Our state already makes significant investments in homeless prevention and intervention, and there is good work being done at the local and state levels, including the Head Start on Housing program that is led by the Connecticut Department of Housing and the Office of Early Childhood. This new partnership will improve our coordination and response system in central Connecticut, so we can maximize the impact of our current funding — all to deliver better outcomes for students experiencing homelessness. I want to thank the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving for their generous support, and for recognizing how government and philanthropy can work together in smart ways to improve lives.”
Citing data from the National Center for Homeless Education and elsewhere, the foundation noted:
Originally Published: March 22, 2025 at 5:15 AM EDT