Almost 9,000 Chicago students are homeless (Number has doubled since 2000)

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http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-homeless20.html

For much of the last two years, Reg Benton, a soft-spoken 12-year-old, bounced among his grandmother's house, his dad's place and two homeless shelters with his mother.

Few people knew he was homeless -- his clothes were clean, his hair groomed. But the signs were there. His grades slipped. He stormed out of class one day. He even threw a chair in anger.

"I daydream a lot, worrying," Reg said Tuesday during an interview at the Uptown Salvation Army shelter where he's been staying with his mother and two siblings for the last month. "I was worried about getting a home and coming back with my family."

His mother, Charneise Silas, used to hold a steady job and for 12 years kept her family together in an apartment before being evicted in 2003 after a drug conviction. They've been homeless since.

Number has doubled since 2000