EDLD 5344 School Law
Reflection: The McKinney-Vento Act
For starters, listening to the web-conference recording gave me an in-depth overview of what is known as the McKinney-Vento Act. Personally, I never heard of the act nor did I know that children who are labeled as homeless had such a great law enacted to help them in their education success. After listening to the web conference, and reading other resource material, I learned that the McKinney-Vento legislation requires all state and local educational agencies to design, develop, review, and revise their policies to remove barriers to the enrollment and retention in school of children and youth who are faced with homelessness. Certainly, this would include children and youth experiencing homelessness due to natural or other disasters cause. The development of such policy is critical for all schools to be in regulations and in compliant of the Act, resulting in the enrollment and attendance of homeless students in their schools’.
As with a business corporate disaster policy; implementation of a disasters school district policy are even more important. They provide schools with something that is tangible to uphold during confusion settings of an initial disaster response. If school and district personnel are familiar with McKinney-Vento policies and practices, the immediate school district response to a disaster will be more purposeful and appropriate. The McKinney-Vento Act defines homeless students, as students who lack a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence are considered homeless under the law and are eligible for rendering services. Under the definition of the McKinney-Vento act, schools must know who and where students experiencing homelessness are in order to serve them. This requires knowledge of understanding how to apply the McKinney-Vento Act’s definition of homeless; and increasing awareness of homelessness and the McKinney-Vento Act in schools and the broader community, including disaster relief agencies.
