principal that Medina had lived in San Ysidro all her life. The principal didn’t believe her. “The counselor actu-
ally came to the house and my grandmother showed her the room where I slept. The next day I went to school.” Once Medina started
high school, she began liv- ing permanently with her grandmother. Focusing on academics, however, was a challenge. She couldn’t afford school supplies and remembers getting into trouble because she didn’t have paper or pencils. “The program that I
have now, I understand a lot of these students and how sometimes they don’t have certain things, or when their family is broken, and how they’re struggling in class. I used to sit there in class just wondering where my mom was. A lot of fam- ily issues weigh on our kids, and we’re pressur- ing them to do certain things. I remember just sitting there daydream- ing one time in math class, and the teacher got really upset. I asked her to go to the bathroom, because I needed to go cry.” Medina attributes
her grandmother’s strict household rules to the reason she remained on a straight-and-narrow path. She attended Southwest- ern College and was hired as a teacher’s assistant in San Ysidro. She went on to get a human services degree from University of Phoenix and did an internship at the San Ysidro School District’s Family Resource Center. By 2004 she was hired to a newly created Chil- dren and Family Project Facilitator position, a job nobody at the district had ever done.
Otay Mesa junkyards Medina drives onto State Route 905 going east to Otay Mesa where the terrain turns into wide open space. Brown Field’s shabby air-traffic control looms over the landscape. Behind it, auto-wrecking and recycling companies stack car parts in expan- sive dirt lots. During the weekday, you can hear the crunch of metal com- ing from the scrap yard. Storage lots, often located along unpaved roads, contain boats, vehicles, and trailers. Medina col- loquially refers to all these as “the junkyards.”
A dystopia of sorts,
but Medina is unafraid. People recognize her and know she is here to help. She drives her truck off-road, kicking up dust clouds. An unofficial street sign hangs on a chain-link fence. “Pogo Row,” it reads. Medina
me doesn’t make sense.” All of them are U.S.
citizens, Medina says, but because they are out in the trailers, they can’t demon- strate that they are resid- ing in the U.S. The owners don’t give out any receipts. The agreement is, if you live there, you can’t apply
“If they are all in one room, and it’s a family of four, they are considered to be doubled up, and it’s considered homeless.”
says a few families have found ways to rent the run-down trailers inside these lots. The trailers don’t have
running water or electric- ity. Families might use the nearby trucker station to take showers. “When we get a new enrollment, they’ll try to explain to me where they are, but I always need to meet them at the school site; then I follow them, because the address, it’s just so differ- ent. The address they give
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make it nearly impossible to ascertain who might be renting the trailers out to these desperate families.
Doubled up is
considered homeless As Medina drives her Ford back onto High- way 905, the contrast becomes striking. In the distant south, mammoth warehouses straddle the U.S.-Mexico border wall. Nearer to the freeway, housing developers are building single-family homes. A sign reads, “Now Selling Maravilla & Esperanza Luxury Townhomes. Up to 4 Bedrooms.” On the northern
side of 905, a suburban community called Ocean View Hills perches atop a mesa overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Built about 15 years ago, many of the homes are opu- lent — some have up to five bedrooms, 3000 square feet, and three-car garages. This community defines the American dream. However, there’s a hidden truth at work: many of Medina’s home- less students live two and three families in apart- ments, condominiums, or in these single-fam-
ily homes. At the beginning of
every school year, stu- dents must provide two bills that establish proof of residency. If they show a bill that is not in their name, they need to fill out a Declaration of Res- idency & Responsibility and a “McKinney-Vento” form.
Medina is then called
to make a home visit. She must verify that the stu- dent lives in the housing unit. If they’re doubled up, the owner of the house needs to come in and sign documentation. According to the fed-
eral McKinney–Vento Homeless Assistance Act of 1987, the definition of a homeless student includes more than just kids sleep- ing on the streets. McKin- ney-Vento says homeless students include those who live in motels or trailers, those who have been abandoned by their parents and are staying with extended family members, and children who live in “doubled up” housing — that is, more than one family per unit. Back in 2004, San
Ysidro Unified School District was one of the first in the county to
26 San Diego Reader February 23, 2017
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