Researchers and policymakers hypothesize that housing can be a platform for academic achievement among low-income students that is, high-quality, affordable housing, located in safe neighborhoods can go beyond providing basic shelter, and stability and can help provide a stable environment where children access high-performing schools, learn, and succeed academically. Most of the empirical evidence to date, however, focuses on the absence of high-quality, affordable housing and its consequences for children. There is a dearth of research on how housing can be a positive pathway to achieving better school outcomes. Further, methodological limitations plague research on both the negative and positive effects of housing and school outcomes, making it difficult to draw conclusive findings. To help inform policymakers and move policy forward, this paper discusses the current state of housing in the United States, provides a conceptual framework for housing as a platform to improve educational outcomes for children, reviews the existing evidence that supports conceptual models, and identifies the major gaps in research. Finally, it proposes a list of projects that make up a research agenda for understanding the issue and guiding investments in the new research.

The federal government has focused on improving housing for U.S. households since the introduction of the Housing Act of 1937 and the subsequent 1949 Housing Act, which articulated the goal of “a decent home and suitable living environment for every American family” (P.L. 87-71, Sec.2, as cited in Newman 2008). While “a decent home and suitable living environment” is often thought of as one package, it is made up of many different dimensions including housing stability, affordability, quality, and neighborhood location. 1All these dimensions may matter in different ways for meeting children’s basic needs and helping them achieve positive educational outcomes. Since Congress passed these pieces of legislation, housing policies and programs have led to vast improvements in some dimensions of housing, while other dimensions have fallen seriously behind. Housing quality, though still a problem for some, has improved significantly since the 1940s, when lead paint, lack of plumbing, and shoddy and aging buildings were commonplace (Turner and Kingsley 2008). Slum removal, large investments in assisted housing, and strict enforcement of housing codes have improved housing quality overall. While these improvements have been significant, about 3.2 million households still live in severely or moderately inadequate housing (i.e., problems with plumbing, heating, electricity, maintenance, and overcrowding) in the private market (U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development [HUD] 2005). And with no or limited funding for capital improvements, many households living in publicly assisted housing experience substandard housing quality (HUD 2011b).