Special Schools for Homeless Students Bursting at the Seams

Students reach for snacks during an after-school program at the Monarch School, a public school for homeless students in San Diego. The school is one of a handful of schools across the country that are allowed by federal law to serve only homeless students.

—Sandy Huffaker for Education Week

By Michelle D. Anderson

When Sarita Fuentes thinks of homelessness, she doesn’t conjure the stereotypical image of a disheveled older man pushing a shopping cart through an urban neighborhood—she thinks of her students.

“What I see are these babies—elementary school children and their siblings,” said Ms. Fuentes, the co-principal and chief executive officer of the Monarch School, a San Diego-based public K-12 institution that exclusively serves homeless students.

Begun by the San Diego County Office of Education as a drop-in center for homeless high school students, the 170-student Monarch School is now a public-private partnership between the San Diego school board and the nonprofit Monarch School Project. The school is one of a small number of schools across the country that specifically serve students affected by unstable housing conditions. Those schools, along with other schools nationwide, are seeing a growing number of...