Architectural students at the University of Texas at San Antonio are using what they learned in the classroom to change the lives of children.

"They are very real problems I have never had to deal with,” student Amanda Phelps said.

Phelps is talking about problems like falling victim to human trafficking.

"These children have had very difficult lives,” she said. “They've been abused, and they've been told by people that they are kind of less than a person sometimes."

Four teams in a master’s program were asked to create a transition home for victims trying to piece their lives back together. Phelps’ team has one idea.

"Taking a mosaic idea of something that is broken – kind of as a metaphor for the children – and then making it whole and putting the pieces back together again,” Phelps said.

Students clocked a minimum of 4,000 hours working on the plans.

"I was very pleased with what they had produced,” said Sue Ann Pemberton, the director of the school’s Center for Architectural Engagement.

Pemberton says the San Antonio Police Department asked for help designing a youth facility that would help meet the housing needs of a growing problem coming out of the shadows.

"Most people don't think it exists,” Pemberton said. “It's really one of the hidden things, and people don't know about it, people don't talk about it. But once you mention the statistics, it's like, ‘Wow, why doesn't this come to the top? Why isn't it a bigger issue?’"

For the architecture students, the lesson went beyond the design.

"I think it is like one in every five human trafficking victims that come through the U.S. come through San Antonio because of the I-35, I-10 interchange,” student Sandra Montalvo said.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice, the San Antonio area is a major human trafficking distribution route. In 2013, the San Antonio Police Department reported 3,600 runaway children, and in Bexar County, 263 children were flagged as potential sex trafficking victims.

If all goes well with funding, the University of Texas at San Antonio projects could go from the drawing board to the real world in three years.