Student Raising Awareness Of Teen Homelessness

1 in 3 of the homeless in America are under the age of 18.

Souhegan senior Erin Heaney wants to make sure more people know about this fact and work towards a change. She has dedicated her Senior Project to raising awareness about teen homelessness and finding a way to contribute to a solution.

“You don’t see it on the news or hear kids talking about it,” said Heaney. “It is not an issue most people know about, but if they know about it then maybe they will care and act.”

Each year, seniors at Souhegan High School are given the opportunity to pursue an interest, passion, or curiosity through a yearlong project known as their Senior Project. 

Heaney will be screening a film called Sixteen Forty-Nine at the high school, which looks into the lives of homeless teens struggling to maintain their education. The movie will be shown on Friday, April. 6 at 7 p.m.

The screening is open to the public and admission is free, but donations will be accepted and used towards helping homeless teens.

The Souhegan senior said that she had never heard of the teen homelessness problem before starting her project, but was moved by the movie trailer for the documentary. It stuck with her because it was kids her age dealing with serious issues.

These individuals can experience temporary homelessness after running away from a hostile environment, or getting kicked out of their home. She said that 1 in 12 kids will experience homelessness at some point in their lives.

“I was surprised at the numbers, it is more widespread than I would have thought,” she said.

Her research did not turn up much on the issue in New Hampshire, which turned up only vague statistics to what she believes is a much larger problem. Heaney herself knows of local teens who have experienced temporary homelessness.

“It is not this far away issue because it happens in towns like Amherst,” said Heaney. “You don’t know who you are sitting next to in class that could be dealing with these problems.”

While showing the documentary will help get the word out, finding an organization in the state that helps homeless teens has been an issue. She wanted to donate money to a homeless shelter, but children under the age of 18 are not allowed to stay in homeless shelters.

She has found a few potential programs that are dedicated to helping New Hampshire teens.

Heaney sees this as the first step to making some kind of improvement in these teens’ lives hopes that showing the Sixteen Forty-Nine documentary will inspire others to take action.

“I don’t want people to walk into this thinking that going to see this movie is going to change anything,” she said. “It may seem hopeless, but there can be a solution if people get involved. We can fix this.”