While working on my teaching project in preparation for presenting it to my Rethinking Politics class this week, I realized how much I really have learned about homelessness in America this semester. My presentation is about undercounting homeless populations, which is certainly an area we have covered a lot in class, but I have been able to find new and interesting information as well. After putting more work into this topic, I really do think its one of the largest problems facing the homeless population. If they are being undercounted, then they are more likely to have fewer services provided to them. And if cities are being given smaller pools of funds from HUD because of their slim counts, then they are not able to make as many city or county wide changes to work towards eliminating homelessness. From my research for the project, more than anything I have found that the history of homeless counts have been inconsistent and tumultuous, and that no matter how successful a count may seem, there are still negative social and political implications.  This was especially apparent when we Skyped with Point-in-Time experts, who were able to identify that despite the best of intentions, there are still modes of manipulation that find their way into the mix. I’m hoping this is a political and social issue many of my classmates in the other class are not aware of, so that they will have a lot to learn!