Student homelessness in Los Angeles County climbed nearly 30% in a single school year, far outpacing state and national trends, according to new UCLA research warning that the crisis is deepening just as the funding built to address it runs dry.
An estimated 61,249 K-12 students experienced homelessness across the county in the 2023-24 school year — the highest total in five years and up from 47,689 the year before — the UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools reported. The 28.4% jump was nearly double California's 16% rise over the same period and outpaced a 25% national increase recorded over an earlier two-year span.
"Los Angeles County is facing a rapid escalation in youth homelessness," said Mayra Cazares-Minero, a research analyst at the center and a co-author of the report. "A shortage of housing, economic instability and other barriers is making access to housing more difficult, just as important temporary funding streams and policies supporting access to housing are expiring."
Researchers linked the surge partly to housing costs. Citing the U.S. Government Accountability Office, the report noted that every $100 increase in median rent is associated with a 9% rise in homelessness, a dynamic that pushes families with school-age children into unstable or inadequate living situations. Improved identification by school liaisons hired with pandemic-era funds also drove counts higher.
The burden falls unevenly. Three of every four students experiencing homelessness in the county in 2023-24 were Latino, though Latino students make up about 65% of overall county enrollment. Students classified as English learners accounted for 34% of homeless students countywide, and in some San Gabriel Valley districts up to about 55%. Almost 12% were Black, above the statewide share but below the national figure of 25%.
Homelessness also clustered geographically. The 10 districts with the highest rates reported homelessness two to six times the statewide average. Norwalk-La Mirada Unified, in the county's East region, topped the list with nearly one in three students unhoused, followed by Wilsona Elementary in the Antelope Valley at 18.3%. Three of the five highest-rate districts — Rowland Unified, Mountain View Elementary and Bassett Unified — are in the San Gabriel Valley.
The academic toll is steep. Chronic absenteeism affected 37.2% of the county's homeless students, compared with 22% of students overall, and about one in three homeless students was in high school. Students in high-homelessness districts also changed schools more often than their county and state peers.
The report's central warning is financial. A one-time infusion of $98.7 million in federal American Rescue Plan money for homeless students in California — used to hire liaisons and provide services such as transportation, emergency motel stays and tutoring — had to be spent by September 2024 and reached a funding cliff in January 2025, earlier still for many local districts. The remaining dedicated federal source, the McKinney-Vento Act's Education for Homeless Children and Youth grant, totals just $129 million nationwide, and only 16 of the county's 80 school districts receive it. Many districts now lean on community donations and expiring grants to cover basic needs.
A companion brief drawing on interviews with district and county liaisons found that many students are never identified. Fear of stigma, child welfare involvement or immigration enforcement keeps families from coming forward. One official described immigration agents targeting an unhoused family living in a multi-family home; others said unaccompanied youth often enroll through a caregiver and are recognized only after a crisis exposes that they are couch surfing or living in a car. Families doubled up in another household frequently do not consider themselves homeless at all.
The authors urge state, county and district leaders to sustain and expand McKinney-Vento and related funding, standardize how students are identified, integrate fragmented data systems and target resources to high-need areas including the San Gabriel Valley and Antelope Valley. They also call for bilingual staff and culturally responsive outreach to Latino and English-learner families.
"It is unclear how California — or the nation as a whole — will continue to support students experiencing homelessness, especially as numbers continue to rise while funding and focus is fading," said Joseph P. Bishop, the center's executive director and the report's co-author. "It is essential that California and Los Angeles County take urgent, coordinated action."
The report, "Rising Numbers, Fading Resources," is available on the Center for the Transformation of Schools website.