This week is National Homelessness Week. Before I started interning at CCH, I doubt I would have known this. It doesn't receive the same kind of attention as Black History Month, or even Arbor Day. Homelessness is a difficult thing to think about. It is an issue that for most people is easy to comprehend in the abstract, but more challenging to confront head-on. The idea of not having a home, not having anything constant, is one that is nearly impossible for most of us to grasp.
As someone who has never had to worry about where I would sleep at night, I will probably never fully understand what it is like to be homeless. That was my biggest impediment when I started working with the CCH Law Project – it wasn’t that I didn’t care, it was that I didn’t know how to care. Homelessness is a huge issue to approach and there are a million different ways to care about it. However, like anything else that seems insurmountable, the only solution is to start somewhere.
I took my time testing the waters. I learned to manipulate the coalition's army of temperamental office equipment and became fluent in the under-appreciated origami of tri-fold brochures. And then, being 20 years old and thus genetically primed to be self-centered, I sought out and discovered the part of the issue that I could relate to the most: education.
I have grown up a lover of school, a voracious reader and writer; perhaps this is why I care so much about the work the Law Project does for the education of homeless children. I see now that I may have taken my education – and its status as just one of many constants in my life – for granted.
Education may not seem like a top priority for the homeless population: When basic needs like food and shelter aren't being met, education can seem like a luxury. However, access to it can be a light in the dark for homeless children, offering the opportunity to transcend a bleak situation. Currently, a lot of homeless kids have to fight to get in school, and a lot of them still struggle once they’ve been enrolled. Homeless children and youth face a myriad of obstacles, but the Law Project works to eliminate the barriers to education so that school can be a constant, the constant, that can potentially become a gateway to any number of possibilities. The right to an education is social justice at its most fundamental level, and in a life otherwise lacking stability, education is everything.
As a college student who fears appearing too earnest, I hesitate to mention the overused Margaret Mead quote – “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has” – but it seems particularly applicable to the staff at the coalition. I am struck on a daily basis by the ability to get things done, by the level of commitment and the willingness to take the extra step, convenience aside. There is a staggering amount of unmet legal need for low-income people in Illinois, but I’m very proud to be part of an organization that reaches out specifically to one tremendously vulnerable population, with a particular focus on securing and protecting the educational rights of homeless children and youth.
- Claire Lombardo, Paralegal intern
