The National Partnership to End Youth Homelessness* has developed a checklist of essentials for ending homelessness in your community. All essentials require participation from every sector of the community, and that includes you. You’re a lot more powerful than you think you are. Here are ways you can bring about some real change in your world.

Plan

Why plan? There will never be an end to homelessness if strategies aren’t created that focus on ending the problem.

What can you do? Look around you, go to you nearest homeless shelter and ask questions. Find out if there’s an action plan to tackle the problem. If not, write to your local congressman or representative. As a matter of fact, write to both! Get your friends together and organize a rally in front of city hall. Do Something! If you want to be heard, you have to make yourself heard!

Data

Why are numbers and facts important? How can you possibly help homeless youth them if you don’t know anything about them? Like, how many there are, how long have they been on the streets, what do they really need?

What can you do? Go to your local homeless center and ask if they need help collecting a database of the homeless youth in your community. Get your people together and make a project of it. And don’t forget to let Do Something know about the amazing actions you’re taking to bring about real change.

Emergency Prevention

What’s the use of this? One of the best ways to resolve teen homelessness is to prevent it from happening in the first place.

What can you do? Do you know if there’s a homelessness prevention plan in your community? Visit your local community center and homeless shelter, and find out. Call local runaway hotlines and ask. And if there isn’t, don’t stop there! Visit local tenant and landlord meetings and work to get them to agree to get involved. Remember to go armed with data. People react to information so they are more likely to get involved if they see that the problem is real. If you can get a homeless teen to join you, do that! A face is more powerful than a number any day.

Outreach

Why is outreach important? Strong and positive relationships with adults and programs has been known to get youth off the streets.

What can you do? Find out if your local community center has an outreach program that goes out onto the streets and reaches out to teens, offering any assistance necessary? If not, rally to get that in place. If it already does, see what you have to do to become an outreach worker.

Services

What’s the use? Homeless youth need help getting off the streets and getting themselves together.

What can I do? Check out the services that are in place for homeless youth. Ask the youth themselves about their experiences with the system. Do they have to climb through hoops to get service? What do they want that isn’t already available to them? Now that you’re armed with this info, run with it. Again, write to your congressman, governor, mayor, sheriff, whoever you think has a direct hand in the pot.

Youth Development

Why is this important? You’re youth, aren’t you? Think about what you need to help you develop skills and confidence? Are you more productive and empowered when your leadership and decision making skills are flexed, and you feel like you have influence over what really matters in your world? This is the case with most youth.

What can I do? Find out if the programs available for the homeless in your area engage them in meaningful ways. Do they feel like they have a direct say over decisions made in their program development? Are they allowed to periodically evaluate the programs? If not, do some research and visit your local agencies equipped with info on how they can better serve homeless youth. [for more info visit National Alliance to End Homelessness]

Income

Why is this important? One of the key ways to ending youth homelessness is helping youth secure income through employment or benefits.

What can I do? Go to your local center and find out if they help in this area. Do they provide assistance with filling out applications and resume writing? Are educational and vocational programs offered? If not, rally, petition, or hold a letter writing drive. Organize your friends and offer job application and resume writing workshops for youth.

Systems Prevention

What’s this? Some of the youth on the street have aged out of the foster care system or were released from juvy without safe, affordable housing.

What can you do? Find out if in your area there’s any discharge planning for youth released from public institutions like mental health facilities and juvenile correction facilities. How do you do this? Visit your local court house or mental facility. Ask the youths you encounter in the shelters. If you find that there’s nothing available, lobby for change. Hold a rally, organize an info drive, get signatures on a petition. The point is that you not sit there and do nothing. Do something!

Youth Housing

What’s the use? The main goal is to get homeless youth safe, stable, affordable shelter. But the shelter should be focused on two things: lessening both the length of time youth are homeless and the number of times they become homeless.

What can you do? Find out if this is the case with the services in your area. If it isn’t, contact your local and state homeless organizations to see what you can do to change that. And get people involved, including your friends and the homeless youth you’re trying to help. There’s power in numbers.

Permanent Housing

Why is this important? Because of the major causes of homelessness is an enormous lack of affordable housing.

What can you do? Write letters to your local government officials, hold rallies outside of housing organizations, circulate petitions. Nothing will change if people don’t start to speak up.

Education

What’s the use? If people don’t know how big the problem is, they won’t care to do something about it.

What can you do? After you’ve gathered all this important information, don’t keep it to yourself. What good is knowledge if it isn’t shared? Run out and spread the word! Tell your parents, teachers, peers, priest, rabbi, anyone and everyone who will listen. And tell them what they can do to help.

*The National Partnership to End Youth Homelessness is a consortium of the Child Welfare League of America, National Alliance to End Homelessness, National Foster Care Coalition, National League of Cities, National Network for Youth, and Volunteers of America.

Source: National Alliance to End Homelessness, National Coalition for the Homeless