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"With a baby boomer turning 55 every eight seconds for the next 17 years, the senior housing market is already strong, with new projects opening throughout the Sacramento region. But low incomes, a devastating recession and high costs of care present challenges both for seniors and developers. Affordable and high-end projects alike face obstacles."

"An advisory committee, racing to meet a November deadline to recommend a new student-assignment system for Boston, is weighing whether to give low-income students a priority to attend better-performing schools in other neighborhoods, a potentially divisive move that could address inequities but also take away seats from more affluent applicants who live nearby."

"Gourmet soups were served to the public Thursday at the annual Celebrity Soup Kitchen as part of a fundraiser to help low-income older adults pay their utility bills."

"Poverty has a way of taking things away from you,' a superintendent from a desperately poor South Texas school district said Wednesday, during Day 3 of the state's school funding trial. Early testimony has highlighted challenges facing school districts trying to meet tougher academic standards with insufficient funding, they say."

"The Tribune compared Cleveland schools with high-poverty student populations, because all of the city's traditional schools and most charter schools serve large numbers of disadvantaged students. Sixty-four percent of traditional schools serving high-poverty populations got D and F academic ratings, compared with 32 percent for charter schools. Statewide, however, Ohio's high-poverty charters trailed, by a slight margin, the state's traditional public schools."

"A rapidly growing Hispanic enrollment will require the state and school districts to spend more money because so many of the students come from poor families, a population expert testified Tuesday."

"The Lafayette Parish School System should look for ways to diversify the student population on its campuses if it wants to improve achievement in its high-poverty schools, Lafayette City-Parish Council member Kenneth Boudreaux said during a Monday evening forum focused on the impact of poverty on schools."

"In Fremont, an estimated 33.8 percent of the black population was living below poverty level from 2006 to 2010, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Nearly the same number of Hispanics -- 32.5 percent -- in Fremont also were living below poverty level. Some students come from single-parent families where their lone parent works and relies on them to help around the house, care for younger siblings or get a job to pitch in, Jackson said. Students who have jobs that require a lot of hours sometimes have difficulty fitting in study time and homework, she said."

"Past recordkeeping problems have come back to trouble Kansas City Public Schools and threaten the district's services for homeless students. The district has lost a $150,000 federal grant and this week let go of three of the five employees who had been on the homeless services team, including the program coordinator."

"The study also reaffirmed the achievement gap that exists between low-income students and others when it comes to graduation. Low-income students are less likely to graduate within four years, and in some districts, the graduation rate for these students is 40-50% (Flint, Kalamazoo, Grand Rapids), while in others it is closer to 70% (Southfield, Dearborn),' the study found."

"Whether Texas prospers or gets pulled down by poverty hinges on educating the state's fastest-growing population - Hispanics - demographer Steve Murdock said Tuesday during opening testimony of a school funding lawsuit."

"The lawsuits were filed after the Legislature cut $4 billion in state funding to schools and another $1.4 billion for grant programs in 2011. The plaintiffs note the money was cut even though Texas' population has boomed and the number of low-income students has skyrocketed. Students from low-income families generally cost more to educate because many require instruction to learn English or participate in costly remedial programs outside the classroom."