WIDER POLICIES
Homelessness and Education and Skills

Reports by organisations working with homeless people suggest that levels of education and skills are generally much lower amongst their clients/members than for the population as a whole.  For example, both Crisis and the Foyer Federation have estimated that around half of homeless young people have no qualifications compared to 5% of the population as a whole, and Centrepoint's Youth homelessness statistics estimate that over 40% of their clients have no qualifications^[1]

In most cases, poor educational attainment will not be the cause of homelessness.  Clearly, however, qualifications and study can increase self-esteem and improve prospects of finding work and can thus help both to prevent and resolve homelessness.

The experience of Crisis is that life skills are at least as important as formal educational qualifications.  The material in this section is therefore concerned with education and skills in the broadest sense.

End notes

[1] The 16 hour rule - past its sell by date, Foyer Federation, 2003.  Centrepoint's. Back to text

Also, Statistics about homelessness, Crisis, 2005.

Page last modified on 07/07/2006 at 14:51