Los Angeles is home to the largest homeless veteran population in the country: men and some women who live in cardboard boxes; sleep under bridges; or in best-case scenarios, find shelter and support in one of the residential centers set up for their care. Their mental health needs are many: psychotherapy to dispel the nightmares and flashbacks that continue to haunt them, professional help in overcoming decades of substance abuse, and assistance in re-establishing fractured relationships.

Thanks to a new partnership with the U.S. Veterans Initiative—the largest non–profit organization in the country dedicated to helping homeless and at-risk veterans—students at The Chicago School Counseling Center are getting a hefty dose of the real-world experience that is central to their education, while also addressing some of the long-unmet needs of this population. Dr. Melodie Schaefer, director, who refers to her program as a “counseling center without walls,” oversees the work of six students at U.S. Vets centers in Inglewood and Long Beach.

“This is such a critical population,” says Dr. Schaefer, who devoted much of her career to working with veteran groups before joining The Chicago School in 2008. “On any given night, more than 40,000 homeless veterans call the streets of L.A. home.” The students provide individual and group therapy in projects that seek to reunite veterans with their children, counsel women veterans suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder or sexual trauma, and work with disabled men struggling with substance abuse or transitioning from prison to mental health facilities.

While U.S. Vets serves men and women of all ages and from all wars, students have found that a majority of their clients are veterans of Vietnam, a conflict that few graduate school students remember.

“At least half of my clients are accessing services for the first time,” says Clinical Psy.D. student Shannon Chavez, to underscore how long it has taken some veterans—especially those from Vietnam—to take the step of seeking services. “I’ve never worked with this population before and have never had the opportunity to see the effect of going through life homeless. It’s been a powerful experience.”

The students, all pursuing Clinical Psy.D.s at the Westwood or Los Angeles campuses, talk about the emotional challenge of hearing clients’ life stories. While bound by confidentiality that prevents them from sharing specific cases, they speak in broad terms about once-strong men going to war for their country, coming home to the disdain many held for Vietnam veterans, desperately needing—but not receiving—treatment for PTSD or major depression, attempting suicide, and being rejected by families who felt they should “tough it out.”

“Some are very open and just want to be understood,” Kimberly Eddy-Bross says of the clients she has encountered. “But others can’t talk about their war experiences at all.”

For some students, a particularly daunting task has been working with women who suffered sexual harassment while in the military. They are among the 15 to 50 percent of women who represent what Dr. Schaefer refers to as the military’s “best-kept secret”—women who were harassed or abused by their male counterparts while serving. These veterans, who are served through the U.S. Vets residential ADVANCE Women’s Program, represent a variety of ages, including some Vietnam veterans who are just now seeking help for the first time.

“They didn’t access services for years because they didn’t dare go to a facility where the males from the units were also being treated,” Dr. Schaefer says. “But these women have now reached out for help and are beginning to confront the issues that have been with them since their active duty days.”

U.S. Vets currently serves around 1,100 former military personnel through mental health services, job readiness training, and transitional housing and permanent housing for the homeless.