Schools Taking Federal Dollars for ‘Homeless’ Kids Who Decide to Run Away from Home

25 Mar, 2015 by Warner Todd Huston

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A mother of a teenager in Missouri has discovered that her son’s high school has classified the boy as a “homeless” student in order to get thousands in federal subsidies quite despite the mother saying she wants her boy to live at home.

Teenagers can be a chore, we all know, and in the case of this Missouri mother her boy ran away from home to go live with his girlfriend. Essentially, this boy is not homeless. But once the school found out that the kid ran away from home school administrators rushed to re-classify him as “homeless” so that the school could get big dollars in federal subsidies.

The story comes from The Missouri Torch…

When Deanna Sporleder’s 17 year-old son announced he was spending the night at his 16 year-old girlfriend’s house, her home life turned upside down, and part of it was subsidized by federal grants to the local school.

Deanna and her husband were against their son leaving home and moving in with his teen girlfriend, but the girl’s parents consented and the local law enforcement, both county and city, told Deanna that at seventeen, her son could move out and they had no power to stop him.

A few months later, while signing her other children up for school, she asked what she should do about the situation with her son regarding enrollment.

“Not only did they tell me not to worry about it, my son was actually in the school counselor’s office at that very moment, registering as an unaccompanied youth and being identified as ‘homeless,’” Sporleder said.

Her son was categorized as being in a “doubled up” situation, meaning living with friends or relatives due to a lack of housing. But he had housing and a loving family that wanted him home.

Rather than attempt to reach out and reconcile things with his family, the school labeled Sporleder’s son as homeless and began subsidizing his choice.

So, essentially schools are now making money of kids running away from home!

The Missouri Torch has a whole lot more info on this story so go check it out.