Homelessness in the United States is as a revolving-door crisis.

This means that a person can be

homeless on a given night and not be homeless the following night. One is homeless if he or she spends a
night in a shelter for homeless people or a place that is not for human accommodation. Many other
definitions exist. However, the main consensus on homelessness is that it is a condition and not an
attribute or status. Many also agree that the Federal government should invest now more than ever towards
reducing homelessness. One of the hurdles faced by the government is how to determine the portion of the
population that is homeless.
In the United States, estimates on the number of homeless people are often inaccurate. One of the reasons
for this inaccuracy is because local counts are of homeless people usually rare. The main reason, however,
stems from the fluctuation of the number of homeless people. How then can the size of the homeless
population be determined?
One of the ways counts can be designed is by establishing the number of homeless people in a given night.
The Census Bureau refers to this as a point-in-time (PIT) count. Another complex variation of the PIT
method involves determining the number of people homeless for one night or more within a given time.
Point-in-time-count methods vary and are not perfect. However, when these counts are compared over a
time, the trend in numbers can be used to determine whether the homeless population has decreased or
increased. For example, PIT estimated the homeless population in the US at 643,067 and decreased by
1% to 636,017 in 2011. This was as decrease of approximately 7,000 people.
The size of the homeless population in the U.S. as established through PIT counts depends on a number of
factors such as the housing market conditions, shelter rules and prevailing weather conditions. However,
housing market conditions contribute the biggest percentage to the homeless population. This is because
most homeless people are either poor or severely poor. Most homeless people are male. In 2007, 44% of
shelter residents were male. A large portion of the homeless population consists of mentally-ill people.
Determining the size of the population that is homeless in the U.S. is a daunting task. This is because
homelessness is a condition and not an attribute or status. Additionally, most people are homeless only on
some nights. Because of this, most counts of homeless populations involve methods of determining the
count number of people homeless on a given night. This is a Point-In-Time count (PIT). Many people agree
that the investment of Federal resources will reduce homelessness in the U.S.
In the U.S., there is a crisis in public education. Basically, American public education stands somewhere in
the middle of country rankings in terms of testing in reading, mathematics, and science (DeSilver, Drew).
Even though we have the largest economy in the world (Smith, Rob), we seem to not be able to develop
great standard education. Knowing that education is the foundation of any major nation, it seems plausible
that to increase our students’ test scores, pupils should spend more days at school, or at least engage in
more hours of study. There are already about 520,000 students who study at school for extended hours
(“Raise Achievement”), and below is a discussion about why this educational revolution needs to happen.
Though we have as many or more instructional hours put into a school year than most countries, the
amount of days our students spend at school is quite low compared to competing nations. This method
seems like a formula for failure, as the countries with more school days but less instructional hours
do better on test scores (Drehle, David Von). Though there has been a proposal in the U.S. called
“Extended school time,” so far, it has only been implemented in some states, showing excellent results
(“Raise Achievement”). This demonstrates that since individual states are achieving better test results, then
the entire nation would benefit from such an initiative.
Besides great improvement on test scores, more days of study in public education can better reflect the
working schedule of parents and guardians. Catherine Brown, Vice President of Education Policy at the
Centre for American Progress, says that, “Schools make it really hard for working parents—and particularly,
working moms—to fulfil all their responsibilities. Better aligning school and work schedules ought to be a
core component of a progressive agenda to help working families” (“A 9 To 5 School Day: Are Longer
Hours Better for Students and Educators?”). And another note: many families are single-parent units that
have trouble keeping their children’s lives organized and adapting their schedules to their children’s school
times.
There is also the fact of adapting to other interests. Many subjects are simply not covered because of a
lack of time and a strong focus on receiving good test scores in mandatory subjects. According to
the Seattle PI, “A longer school day would allow schools to spend more time on art, music, social studies,
science and physical education. These subjects have been cut back through the years to focus on English
and math in the hopes of boosting test scores. Yet test scores have remained stagnant, and students have
missed out on a more well-rounded education” (Bean-Mellinger, Barbara). A more comprehensive
education commonly develops mandatory classwork. Children who are better at music, art, and other
creative activities have been shown to increase their intelligence and diligence.
Unfortunately, the United States stands only about average in world rankings for mathematics reading, and
science testing, despite it being an economic and political superpower. This means that our standard
education needs to be changed. It seems that the main issue is that students do not spend enough days at
school, as countries that spend more days at school as compared to the U.S. generally outperform in terms
of test scores. Adding more days to the public educational calendar would increase test scores, make it
easier for parents to align their schedules with their children, and also allow the school system to focus on
more creative and neglected studies that are essential for a growing child. Thus, we should make this
initiative a nationwide phenomenon.
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