Transient Children Research

A wide array of children is subsumed under the term transient, and their life circumstances beckon thoughtful consideration of curriculum studies that meet their significant needs. Often suffering from poverty, reflected in their ranks are urban, suburban, and rural children who are homeless; some are part of homeless families and others are street kids who face physical harm, and in some nations, murder. Transient children also include victims of human trafficking, foster children, child laborers, migrant children, and children experiencing residential mobility because of coping moves or forced moves. At the more fortunate end of the transient spectrum are children who are on the move because of their parents' diplomatic, military, missionary, or business career moves. Migrant children, the most mobile population in the United States, include children of agricultural workers who are often needed to labor in the fields and the offspring of families that do seasonal gardening work, meatpacking, vegetable and fruit canning as well as racetrack work that rotates among varied sites. From a worldwide perspective, many transient children are immigrants, internally displaced populations, or refugees. Estimates of the number of children experiencing transience exceeds 12 million. Yet little has been done to meet their curricular needs in a substantive, meaningful manner.

An educational definition of transient children has been explained in some U.S. school districts as, simply, the percentage of students who are not enrolled for the entire previous school year. The U.S. General Accounting office has reported alarming data indicating that, by the end of 3rd grade, one of six children in the United States has attended three or more schools. This study also reported that during a 4-year period, many U.S. schools can see less than 50% of their students remaining in their schools for the entire year.

The growing number of transient children reflects worldwide political, social, and natural crises with some of the victims of these worldwide issues appearing at the doorsteps of U.S. schools. Residential mobility in the United States has also grown and reflects the current mortgage and affordable housing crises in the nation. An estimated 2 million U.S. children have recently joined the ranks of transience because of recent mortgage foreclosures their families have suffered and the lack of affordable rentals in an era of condominium expansion and gentrification of neighborhoods.

When transient children arrive in U.S. classrooms, they often have health, social, and emotional needs in addition to educational needs. They require, perhaps more than some others, a holistic [Page 897]and integrative view of a curriculum. Access to basic nutritional needs and health care has often been inaccessible or sporadic as families are on the move. Emotional issues such as anger over uncontrollable situations and broken peer and teacher relations can develop. Frequently, new language learner needs and sensitivity to cultural diversity are required no matter how short-lived a transient student's attendance may be. Self-esteem may be low for these children because of the stigma attached to the economic, mobility, and housing issues they face. The little educational research that has focused on transient children reveals achievement lags and gaps as well as high correlations between transience and dropout rates.

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