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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Thoughts on this article?
Let's keep this drama free, just voice your own opinion while accepting others 
I don't know how to make it clicky, sorry
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Re: Thoughts on this article?
Here my own opinion. This makes me furious. This mother was trying to make sure her son can have an education - a life. End up better than her. What else can she do? As a homeless person I guess it automatically means your children are doomed.
All she did was use a friend's address. It is not like she just wanted to get into a different school or like she was trying to steal anyone's identity. All she wanted was for her son to be able to go to school.
It makes me extremely angry that not only is the boy not allowed in the school anymore but she may be facing jail AND her friend was kicked out of the home.
I know, some people might get upset over tax dollars that are funding the kid... or what if every homeless person did that. But for one, not many homeless people seem to have the sense in even trying to make an education possible for their kids... and to be quite honest, I'd rather see my tax dollars go to a child in need than the government for some stupid project that is not necessary
I don't understand why she didn't register her son at the address of the homeless shelter (unless she had fears that he would be taken away b/c she was living in a homeless shelter) where he could have gone to the same school? But I'm not so sure she had many other options, she's homeless, therefore does not have a permanent address to register her son, so I would be interested to see what the school board would say her option would be.
I think they do need to enforce districting though. If you allow it in this one instance then how are you supposed to stop other parents from doing the same thing? What about in districts with good schools, but maybe the parents like the school in the next district because their test scores are just a little bit higher than the school their child should attend. It's part of our public school system, you send your child to the school in the district they live, or you would have parents all over the country falsifying registration information and flooding certain schools. I think charging the mother with first degree larceny is a bit harsh, in this case I think social services needs to work with her to find permanent housing and help her understand the process of registering her child for school and any other assistance programs that would help out her family.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thelookout/20110425/us_yblog_thelookout/rally-for-prosecuted-homeless-mom-who-sent-son-to-a-better-school-district
I didn't read the article, but just wanted to say that I know Baltimore City has a homeless student support program. I believe homeless students are allowed to remain in the school they were in prior to becoming homeless. Also every child has a right to a free and appropriate public education, homeless or not.
Again I have not read the article yet, I just wanted to address the fact that homeless children have a right to an education.
Same thing in Baltimore County. And if someone who is not homeless uses a fake address, they don't go to jail...their child just has to transfer to the correct school.
I see both sides. There are school districts and rules for a reason. I don't know that criminal prosecution is the right thing here, especially if it is not used consistently across the board. That said, I don't believe for a second that she didn't know that she needed to register so that her son had a school district. I would imagine that is standard operating procedure when a parent and child come into a shelter. I also don't really feel bad for the friend. As a resident of public housing there are strict rules, and if you break those rules you get kicked out. She broke the rules when she let her friend use her address, she suffers the consequences. Exceptions create too many loopholes, in a system that is already stressed to the max, and full of loopholes.
This is what's getting me though. I completely agree that homeless children have the right to an education - and IIRC, the federal government agrees. There was just something in Tennessee or Alabama where a homeless family was essentially moving temporarily to the best school districts - kind of jumping around - because under a certain federal law that allowed their kids to go to those schools.
I'm going to have to find that story now bc based on that, it doesn't seem like this fraud was necessary.
Call me heartless but I don't see a problem with this except that it's rare to be criminally charged instead of just correcting the address and moving the kid to the right school. People pay property taxes and schools are districted--the two are inextricably linked which is why it's unfair to just enroll your kid where ever you want. Even based on her quotes in the article, she knew exactly what she was doing. And, the kid could have even gone to the school she desired if she registered at the homeless shelter--win-win, everything is legal.
I don't get why I should feel sorry for someone who had access to what she wanted but still tried to game the system.
Our Share of the Harvest:How a couple cooks from a CSA share. Pick Up Day Week 15
I'm not seeing this as gaming the system though...if this is the same school her son should have been going to anyway since she stayed at that shelter, then this seems like a paperwork issue more than anything.
Honestly...my main thought on this article is that I HATE how news articles are written. 9 times out of 10 I'm left with tons of questions from details they didn't bother to provide that would totally change my opinion of the situation. In this case - why didn't she just register him using the shelter address? Was she afraid of CPS? Did she not know she could do that? Does she normally stay at a different shelther in a crappy district and just "occasionally" stays at the one in the good district? These things are relevant, but of course, not provided.
Although really...obviously the homeless aren't paying property taxes anyway, so does it really matter which district they go to?
Anybody know what do kids of migrant workers do?
My Goodness...another food blog. Featuring: Macarons from a old post with a photo taken by my mom for a break from my crappy food photos!
I would be curious what it is that people recommend homeless parents do to provide as good an education for their kids as they can.
I say gaming the system because she used an illegal method of getting her kid into the school meaning either:
1) She wanted to avoid some penalty that would be associated with registering at the shelter. I can't speculate what that might be but doing something illegal to get something you have gotten anyway means there's an associated cost to avoid or
2) She didn't know registering at the shelter would put her in the desired school district so she did something illegal and hoped she wouldn't get caught.
I 100% agree with you that this SHOULD have been a matter of paperwork and not criminal charges. That's not only unfair (because it doesn't seem to the SOP) but also costly. I have no idea why they would arrest her instead of just get things set up properly.
This is also wild speculation but I think it matters HOW the kid gets into the school because there is a system set up to pay for the homeless kids coming from that shelter--donations, a grant, who knows. If that's true, they need numbers and tracking to keep that funding and having kids get in via illegal methods doesn't help anyone.
Our Share of the Harvest:How a couple cooks from a CSA share. Pick Up Day Week 15