By Stefan Yablonski

 

SUNY Oswego has hired a new homeless liaison who will work with students who face homelessness.

“The Office of the Dean of Students does work with students who are homeless or housing insecure. We actually just recently hired a new case manager for our team who will take over as the campus homeless liaison and work with this student population,” said April Lopez, assistant dean of students, basic needs case manager (Office of the Dean of Students).

“I am the homeless liaison for SUNY Oswego,” Kimberly Fuqua said in July. “I currently work with students that are in foster care and any students that are facing homelessness currently or in the immediate future. I just started this work a month ago; but as a student that has faced many barriers myself, I find this work very rewarding indeed.”

Fuqua has a background in higher education in both admissions and residence life and has worked with many students facing homelessness in those roles as well.

“I don’t know what percent [are homeless] right now. Not all students identify as homeless. You have to seek them out. Because of the stigma attached, they won’t self identify,” she explained. “I’m not sure what the current numbers are. I just started a month ago; I’m trying to find my bearings. That number is higher than what many people think.”

They make sure that students have housing throughout the year, she added.

“They can come to our office for help and we make sure that during the breaks, winter, spring etc, that these students do have adequate housing,” she said. “That’s the No. 1 thing. But we also triage these students to help them with other things, such as transportation. Any student at Oswego they do get a bus pass so they can pretty much go anywhere.”

 

Other services

“We help them with paperwork — many times they need to do paperwork for financial aid. We refer them to different places off campus to get the help that they need,” she said. “We also deal with childcare. For students with children we can connect them with county resources or to the childcare facility here.”

A lot of the homeless students don’t have access to technology.

“We do have a laptop program so students can complete their courses,” Fuqua added. “We can refer students to agencies outside of campus.”

 

Who are the homeless?

“There’s this weird thing when you become a college student — a lot of parents are like, ‘OK, bye.’ So are you really homeless or are you having an argument with your parents — did your parents just say ‘goodbye, you figure it out.’ What kind of rubric do I use to determine true homeless and true independence from families?” she said. It very much is a bigger problem than people realize. It’s more prevalent in the community college setting. I don’t know what we are going to see here. But I do know that homelessness is a huge issue.

“I want to meet with all the students — who may be in need — right before breaks to make sure that they have adequate places to go.  Some of them will go back to wherever they came from. I just want to create a space, a safe space. I want to be a safe space for students; so they feel comfortable coming to me with any issue that they are having. My job is to build a rapport with the students and be a support for them.”

 

Services Available

• Student Emergency Fund: Students facing an unexpected hardship or an emergency may apply for funds through the Student Emergency Fund.

• SHOP Food & Clothing Pantry: As the first student-run food and clothing pantry within the SUNY system, SHOP offers free non perishable food, toiletries, sexual health products and gently used clothing.

• Break Housing and Dining Scholarships: Residential students may apply to stay on campus during breaks (Thanksgiving, winter, spring and summer). Break housing and dining scholarships are available to students who are facing housing or food insecurity during the breaks.

• Emergency Housing: Residence Life and Housing provides short-term emergency housing for SUNY Oswego students enrolled in classes who have circumstances beyond their control which leads to their need for temporary housing.

Contact the Office of the Dean of Students at deanofstudents@oswego.edu  to request emergency housing. If you have an urgent request outside of business hours please contact University Police at 315-312-5555.

To contact April Lopez, assistant dean of students and basic needs case manager, call or email 315-312-2446, april.lopez@oswego.edu

To contact Kimberly Fuqua, assistant dean of students, case manager, call or email 315-312-5483, kimberly.fuqua@oswego.edu