Colleges in New York and across the nation are finding students dealing with housing insecurity and/or homelessness. The State University of New York system is working to help those students by designating someone on each campus to provide assistance and guidance.

Kathleen Lieblich started working as assistant vice president for student well-being at SUNY New Paltz last semester. She hit the ground running, temporarily serving as the homeless liaison on campus.

“It's the best feeling to be able to support them and to be able to know that we're helping them in their journey,” Lieblich said. “We're just a stop on their path in life, but we're really, really fortunate to be able to provide that kind of support to our students.”

A designated person on each SUNY campus is now serving as the homeless liaison, working directly with students who are currently enrolled but may not have a safe or affordable place live by providing support, doing outreach and connecting students with resources to help them find a safe place to live while adhering to their academic and financial needs and capabilities.

“They have a full-time job of being a student, as well as often jobs off campus or on campus,” Lieblich said. “So, we want to provide them every opportunity that we can to connect with the resources that are going to help them to focus on being a student and getting their degree.”

SUNY recognized a need to assist these students and decided to establish the role on each campus as of this past fall, citing a national survey that says 46% of college students experienced housing insecurity and 17% dealt homelessness in the previous year in its report on Long-Term Enrollment and Financial Sustainability released last month.

While Lieblich is temporarily acting as the homeless liaison, she said SUNY New Paltz will be hiring a basic needs coordinator, whose duties will include being the campus’s homeless liaison.

“It's something that is so incredibly important. We want our students to be able to show up and be their best selves in the classroom,” Lieblich said. “If they're worried about where they're laying their head at night, if they're safe, if they have access to food and hygiene products, those are things that we want to be able to help close the gap on.”

SUNY New Paltz senior and Student Association President Xaviana Blunt said this is necessary, as she’s heard what some of her peers are experiencing.

“It's disheartening to hear that some of my peers are facing such an issue, especially because this should be an exciting time,” Blunt said.

Blunt said she believes the homeless liaison on campus can be of major assistance to many students.

“Having a separate person to facilitate that is important because there are so many resources that students don't know about that administration have access to,” Blunt said.

The initiative is aimed at helping students statewide.

“We've certainly seen students that we've been able to support this year, and we look forward to continuing to provide an even higher level of support for them moving forward,” Lieblich said.

The Campus Homeless Liaison Learning Network was also established by SUNY to support each of the liaisons.