CAEH National Conference on Ending Homelessness
The Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness (CAEH) invites policy makers, funders, researchers, advocates, community leaders and front line workers to the National Conference on Ending Homelessness on November 5, 6, and 7, 2018. The conference will be organized into six streams of focus: Leadership, Planning and Practice; Indigenous Homelessness; Women’s Homelessness; Housing First; A Way Home – Youth Homelessness; and Canadian Observatory on Homelessness – Research and Policy. Through this conference, CAEH aims to provide participants with the inspiration, information, tools and training they need to end homelessness.
Register here.
Human Trafficking Prevalence and Child Welfare Risk Factors Among Homeless Youth
As part of Covenant House International’s initiative to research human trafficking among youth experiencing homelessness, The Field Center for Children’s Policy, Practice & Research collected data from 270 youth across three U.S. cities – Philadelphia, Phoenix, and Washington D.C. Of those interviewed, 20% reported being victims of human trafficking. The Center found that several populations, including transgender youth, appear to be particularly vulnerable to the crime. The study includes recommendations for improving research, policy, and practice. They suggest conducting longitudinal work; incorporating administrative data and standardized measures of health and well-being; utilizing such data to identify populations at highest risk; and supporting funding for programming for youth experiencing homelessness at state and federal levels.
Read the report on the IGH Hub.
Supporting Citizenship Among People with Mental Illness or Experiencing Homelessness
According to Abe Oudshoorn of Western University, research conducted by Allison Ponce and Michael Rowe shows that active promotion of citizenship is an important aspect of responding to people with mental illness and/or who are experiencing homelessness. Some ways that Oudshoorn suggests the homelessness service sector can support citizenship include: engaging those who have or are experiencing homelessness into councils, committees, etc.; educating the community about mental health and homelessness through the voices of those with lived experience; supporting those who are newly independent in the community to identify an explicit community based task; and more.
Oudshoorn concludes by reinforcing the idea that “citizenship is not just for those who have reached some pre-determined or culturally conceived level of stability, but is for all people”.
Read the blog post here.
Real-time Data in Ending Homelessness
“We can’t gather the necessary information to house our homeless neighbors solely by counting them anonymously once every two years”, said the Canadian Alliance on Ending Homelessness (CAEH).
In a recent blog post, the Alliance discusses the significance in actionable, real-time, person-specific data within the homelessness service sector. According to CAEH, this kind of data helps communities house people, in the most strategic and effective way. This means finding and prioritizing those in greatest need first and matching each person’s unique needs in a timely manner. In the process, data is maintained as a real-time By-Name List, which is categorized by three inflow measures and two outflow measures. CAEH also suggests that having the most sufficient data collection can help service providers confidently advocate for other necessary resources to reduce or end homelessness.
Read the blog post here.
