ojai news at The Ojai Post :: blog, newspaper, events in Ojai, California

Many do not realize that Ojai boasts a greater number of private boarding schools than any other town in the state.
Thacher, Villanova, Ojai Valley School , Happy Valley (recently reincarnated as Besant Hill) and Oak Grove all bring students and families to town, but also offer viable alternatives for Ojai families and students of every need. Laurel Springs , educating several thousand students, is by far the largest school in the valley. Although it serves families from all over the country, many local kids attend as well. Of course we also have schools for adults like Krotona, and a number of other options a short drive out of the valley. I simply cannot imagine another community with so many educational alternatives.

It is also important to note that few of these schools could exist without substantial support in terms of volunteerism and donations from community families. I know from experience that tuition never covers the real costs of a school, so parents organize bake sales, book sales, auctions, and special events. They sell cookies and lemonade at half-time, they volunteer to read, supervise, drive, and sometimes teach. They donate to the annual fund, scholarshp funds, and building funds.

Schools in fact bring us together. We attend the games and plays and concerts. For those of us with kids, our social lives often evolve around their schools and the families of their school friends. Today at lunch, I ran into a group of homeschool Moms, kids spread around them like petals, who have clearly formed their own community. The fact is that schools promote and sustain community. They are more than a place to store our kids for the day. They are community centers, centers of information and communication as well as education.

We are lucky to have the many schools that we do and they could not be sustained without the support of the larger community. Additionally, some of the finest people I know in this valley are teachers, such as the recently honored Clive and Marion Leeman, people whose lives are animated by dedication and principle.

So this post is nothing more than a tip of the hat to the schools of Ojai and to the parents who support them and the teachers who work in them. We are a better community because of each.