Monarch butterfly Saltillo school Escuelas con Alas program, Digi Mart USA News (Saltillo, Coahuila, Mexico): The monarch butterfly has a new stopover in northern Mexico, and it is not in a forest. It is the schoolyard of the Narciso Mendoza federal elementary school in Saltillo, Coahuila, which has become the first school in the state to join Escuelas con Alas, a pilot program that aims to turn schools into refuges for pollinating insects.
The National Commission of Natural Protected Areas (Conanp) announced the initiative on October 13. According to the agency’s statement, students will record in real time the monarchs passing through their garden.
Those observations will feed migration databases.
Escuelas con Alas is part of the Programa Correo Real, managed by the civil organization PROFAUNA. The Narciso Mendoza school will be the first in the pilot program directly supported by Conanp through its Northeast Regional Directorate and Sierra Madre Oriental office.
The SEP-Semarnat committee, which brings together the education and environment ministries, also participates.
The plan goes well beyond planting flowers. It includes designing habitats and school gardens, separating and managing the school’s own waste, and carrying out artistic activities.
Each achievement earns an environmental compliance medal, which will be displayed on a special board visible to students, families and teachers.
Another goal of the project is to bring nature into the regular curriculum. Conanp says students will track in real time the monarchs that pass through their garden, contributing data to the databases that follow the migration.
Citizen science works precisely this way, with thousands of observers across the map counting what they see.
For Conanp, the step is both an important and strategic achievement. The aim is to bring the knowledge of the protected natural areas of the northeast and the Sierra Madre Oriental into the city.
A local committee made up of Semarnat, Conanp, Conafor, Profepa, the Coahuila environment secretariat and the SEP launched the project after the framework agreement between the SEP and Semarnat was renewed. The committee formally asked PROFAUNA to provide technical support and official recognition for the project while preserving the civil society organization’s authorship.
Conanp coordinates monarch protection through a national strategy covering more than 4,000 kilometers of migration, including hibernation sanctuaries and the migratory route across the country. In the arid and mountainous zones of the north, the agency considers the species’ survival to depend critically on urban refuges such as this one, which it calls “biological gas stations.”
The context helps gauge the news. In the 2025-2026 winter season, monarch colonies occupied 2.93 hectares of forest in Mexico, 64% more than the previous year.
Environment Secretary Alicia Bárcena reported the figure on March 17, when results were presented, citing nine colonies, three in Michoacán and six in the State of Mexico. The development is positive but carries caveats.
In its best season, 1996-1997, the species occupied 18.19 hectares, and Bárcena warned of 2.55 hectares severely damaged inside the reserve by fires, illegal logging and drought.
The Conanp statement leaves several questions open. It does not say how many students participate, which plants the garden will include, or how much funding is involved.
It also does not clarify whether other schools in Coahuila will follow the Narciso Mendoza school’s example. Results will become clearer in upcoming migration seasons.
