Families in Transition

About Families in Transition

Purpose: Designed to provide support services, tutoring, enrichment activities and case management to families in transitional living situations.

Role: To provide assistance to families meeting criteria for the McKinney-Vento Education Act implemented to ensure all students the right to an education regardless of their living situation.  The program provides the necessary supports to increase the likelihood that students living in homelessness or chronic poverty attend school consistently and with little interruption. These services include immediate enrollment, nutrition via the free/reduced lunch program and transportation.

Responsibility: The responsibility of the FIT Social Worker/Counselor is to identify, assess and provide case-management for homeless students and those students at risk of homelessness due to chronic homelessness, or resulting from a natural disaster, incarceration of a parent and/or death of a parent.

McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act

The McKinney-Vento Act was originally authorized in 1987 and most recently re-authorized in December 2015 by the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA).  Everyone who is between the ages of 4 and 21 on September 1st of the school year and has not been expelled, has the right to attend school, even if they:

• Do not live with a parent or legal guardian
• Lives temporarily doubled up with friends or family due to loss of housing or economic hardship
• Sleeps in a shelter
• Sleeps in a campground, car, abandoned building, or other place not designated for, or ordinarily used as regular housing for people
• Lives in substandard housing (no electricity or water)
• Participates in a transitional housing program
• Does not have school records

Services Provided

The Federal McKinney-Vento Act and Texas State Law guarantee that if you meet eligibility requirements you may:

• Enroll in school even without records
• Continue to attend the school in which you were last enrolled, even if you have moved away from that school's attendance zone or district
• Receive transportation from your current residence back to your school of origin
• Qualify automatically for district free/reduced lunch and other district food programs
• Participate fully in all school activities and programs for which you are eligible; and
• Contact the district liaison to resolve any disputes that arise during the enrollment process