A woman in North Carolina is suing a school district, alleging officials forced her children to switch schools while they experienced homelessness.
The suit from the mother, identified as K.L., claims Gaston County Schools; Lisa Phillips, state coordinator for Education of Homeless Children; and the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction failed her children when the district forced the children to leave their original schools while already facing the trauma of homelessness.
The 17-page lawsuit filed on Jan. 26 states K.L. was evicted from her residence in September 2023 while her children were students at New Hope Elementary and Cramerton Middle School.
With two children and nowhere to go, the suit states the disabled veteran mother switched both children to car riders while searching for steady housing. While the family remained in the same city, they were not located in the same school zone following the eviction.
It states they were residing outside the school zone, so they were staying somewhere or other. Since when was it even the schools choice? Taxes and school districts are set up that way. It sucks, but I don’t see how it’s the school’s fault. The mom must have informed the school where they were statlying at it would have been illegal for the school to not make them change.
Depends on district policy and state/local law. E.g., in my kid’s district a parent can request for their child to attend any school of the same grade within the district if space is available, but parents have to provide transportation if it’s not the zoned school. For the district where we lived previously, a family moving out of zone could request that students be allowed to keep attending their current school through the end of the year.
Per the article, both state and federal law allows these kids to continue attending the same school in such situations. It’s the school’s fault because, even if their district has no such policies, the clear and obvious course would be to seek an exception until policy could be addressed to align with the law. Instead, they simply refused to meet with the mother.