School officials said they are currently working to accommodate the surge of new students coming from the Villages of Patterson development under construction. School officials, community members and school officials are concerned that schools will not be able to handle another wave of large-scale development without a mitigation agreement.

Credit: Emma Gallegos / EdSource

Education and housing are often inextricably linked, but policy decisions made in the two sectors are generally siloed, sometimes shaped and adopted without considering the impact that a housing policy might have on education and vice versa .

That of Megan Gallagher research connects the two, focusing on housing and education collaborations that support student academic outcomes. Some of his last work As a senior research associate at the Urban Institute, a nonprofit research organization focused on public policy, he provides school officials and real estate developers with ideas on how to collaborate to desegregate schools by desegregating neighborhoods.

Gallagher also co-author of a report who compiled a list of key housing features that impact children’s educational outcomes:

• Quality of housing
• Housing affordability
• Housing stability
• Quality of the neighborhood
• Housing that creates wealth

In this Q&A, Gallagher explains why these housing features are important in a child’s education and the collaborations that can help children have a fair chance at academic success. The interview has been lightly edited for brevity and clarity.

What is the impact of housing policy on children’s educational outcomes?
It’s really important, when we’re trying to understand the influence of housing on children’s educational outcomes, to examine its unique contribution.

You might have families with the same income levels, (but) one lives in a high-quality house and the other lives in a low-quality house. A poor quality home can impact a child’s health, ability to sleep and sense of security. So the outcome could be very different for that child if they are in a lower quality home.

You highlighted five housing characteristics that impact children’s educational outcomes. Why are these five characteristics so important?
These five characteristics have been extensively studied in the housing policy literature. I didn’t conduct all the original research that led to these results, I just put it all together in one place. It is possible that aspects of housing that have not been measured historically may also influence education.

We know that poor quality housing – those with mold or electrical problems – is associated with lower kindergarten readiness scores. This causal relationship has been established. The relationship between excessive spending on rent is linked to an increase in behavioral problems. Housing instability, and I would really put homelessness and housing insecurity in the category of housing instability, really affects academic stability and then has an effect on math and reading scores. We know that homeownership, that is, homeownership that allows families to build equity, increases the likelihood of attending college. We also know that neighborhood context, such as violence, can disrupt academic progress and prevent children from succeeding in school.

There is therefore evidence that links each of these housing conditions to various aspects of children’s well-being and educational outcomes.

One of the things that we haven’t really done a very good job of is knowing which of these aspects of housing is most important or has the most influence. If we had a million dollars, what would we want to spend that million dollars on to improve educational outcomes? I don’t think we currently have enough evidence to know exactly what the right path to take to achieve this would be.

Do all five characteristics need to be met for children to achieve the best possible academic results?
There is not enough data at this time to allow us to understand which of the five should be implemented or what the likelihood of success is if you have one, two, three or four.

This is an area where we still need more understanding and more evidence, but I don’t think we can wait to make policy decisions until we have all this evidence.

Is the lack of sufficient research one of the consequences of the disconnect between housing and education policies?
Absolutely. I think the sectors are so siled that many of the giant investments in data collection that have taken place at HUD (the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development) or the U.S. Department of Education have not included data elements that capture aspects of the other sector.

When we look at housing data in housing policy, we haven’t collected really detailed data on the children in the family – what schools they attend and how they are doing – that could potentially help connect the data, likewise in the context of housing policy. world of education.

We face a lot of challenges in privacy research, just because you can connect data, right? Is this what program participants agreed to when they decided to enroll their children in public school or when they decided to enroll in a housing assistance program? In many cases, the answer is no.

Some of the best data is truly connected at the local level, where local policymakers work with local agencies who have asked permission and connect the data to refine programs on the ground.

How do we get to a point where we have the information we need to ensure academic success for all children?
This needs to happen on multiple levels. The federal government must encourage the Department of Education and HUD to collaborate and truly support or encourage collaboration in their discretionary grant programs. I really think the federal government has the opportunity to lead and really support this type of work.

But I also think there are so many local organizations that are leading the charge. I think a lot of the case studies I’ve done can help illustrate how flexibility and collaboration can actually translate into a set of programs or practices that support children’s education and stable housing and high quality.

I know that philanthropy really supports a lot of exploration around sector alignment.

I’m really hopeful about this kind of broader vision of how we create policies that think about how multiple systems can influence a child’s performance. But I also think it’s not like there’s all this housing there and the kids aren’t living there. A big part of this work is ensuring that there is always a housing production pipeline that develops housing to ensure that there are enough homes at different price points for everyone to have the opportunity to live where he would like to live.