Monarch School, which serves about 170 students experiencing homelessness in San Diego, closed its Barrio Logan campus temporarily after concerns about possible mold surfaced late last week. Families and staff were notified Thursday and Friday evening, and by Monday, students and their families were showing up not at their usual building but at a parking area outside it, waiting to be redirected to two backup locations across the county.
The closure decision came last Friday, following concerns raised the night before, according to ABC 10News San Diego. Students in kindergarten through fifth grade walked with their teachers to nearby Perkins K-8 School, with classroom space provided by San Diego Unified School District, while students in grades 6 through 12 were bused to the South County Regional Education Center in National City. Families arriving Monday were greeted with check-ins, a welcome, and breakfast, and those who preferred not to relocate had the option of independent study for the week of August 31.
Voice of San Diego reported that a Monarch School Project grant manager said the relocation was ordered specifically so environmental air quality testing could be conducted at the facility, with the nonprofit pledging to follow the guidance of qualified environmental experts as results come in, according to Voice of San Diego. The Monarch School Project is leading that testing process, along with the results and any recommendations that follow. The relocation plan covers August 31 through September 4, and the San Diego County Office of Education and the Monarch School Project have said they intend to continue instruction and essential support services with as little disruption as possible.
A Campus Built for a Vulnerable Population
Monarch School operates inside a renovated 59,000-square-foot former industrial concrete warehouse at 1625 Newton Avenue, known as the Nat and Flora Bosa Campus, which opened in 2013 and replaced a much smaller 10,000-square-foot building to expand capacity, per Davy Architecture. The school runs under an unusual public-private structure: the nonprofit Monarch School Project owns the facility, while the San Diego County Office of Education operates the educational program and staffing inside it.
That partnership dates back to 1988, when the school launched as a single-teacher drop-in program called “The PLACE” before growing into one of the nation's largest K-12 public schools dedicated to unhoused youth, according to background compiled by NBCU Academy. Today the school maintains a 14:1 student-to-teacher ratio meant to support trauma-informed instruction, per Homes.com, since students often enter several grade levels behind their peers.
Why a Temporary Closure Hits So Hard
Because Monarch School exclusively serves youth experiencing homelessness, any disruption to the physical campus carries outsized stakes. Beyond classroom instruction, the Monarch School Project provides shelter navigation, food assistance, hygiene supplies, and mental health therapy to more than 500 unhoused students, alumni, and family members each year. Losing access to the building, even temporarily, means losing access to services many families depend on daily.
The disruption also lands amid a broader regional surge in student homelessness. The San Diego County Office of Education estimates that roughly 20,000 children and youth across the county's 42 school districts are experiencing homelessness during the current academic year. Earlier Voice of San Diego reporting from May 2025 found double-digit percentage increases in student homelessness across several county districts, even as debate continued over how to fund countywide education resources for those students.
Federal Protections and Unanswered Questions on Mold
Under the federal McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, every public school district is required to designate a homeless liaison charged with ensuring unhoused students get immediate school access, meals, and stable transportation — protections that underpin how districts like SDCOE respond when emergencies force sudden relocations. California's own mold guidance leaves plenty of gray area: the state Department of Public Health does not set numerical limits on indoor mold spore exposure, instead directing schools and property managers to focus on eliminating water intrusion and any visible mold growth, according to Vert Environmental. That means confirmation of mold, and any remediation timeline, depends on what the ongoing environmental testing turns up.
This is not the first time Monarch School's campus has gone dark unexpectedly. Storm flooding shut Monarch's doors in January 2024, when heavy rains and regional power outages forced temporary closures across several South San Diego campuses. For now, families are being asked to navigate a split campus for the week, with elementary students at Perkins K-8 and older students in National City, while testing results determine what comes next for the Barrio Logan building.
