Vistamar School provides a "focus on global studies... courses in Web design and... seminars on ethics", as well as, "critical thinking, the nature of truth, comparative religion and psychology".[2]
The school has a 76,000-square-foot (7,100 m2) building[2] at 737 Hawaii Street in El Segundo[3] and has remodeled a warehouse space (formerly used by DirectTV)[4] for student use.[5] It was reported, "Vistamar, the South Bay's newest private high school, has come a long way. In just a few short months, a giant industrial box... has been carved out, retrofitted, built up, wired and painted to create a 21st-century campus,"[5] with "striking shades of orange, green and blue... A cluster of classrooms and offices wraps around a commons area where teachers and students will be encouraged to discuss academics amid banks of computers."[5]
In addition, the site needed, "major upgrades to bring the structure in line with seismic and fire codes. But beyond engineering upgrades, there was also the challenge to create a kid-friendly atmosphere with lively colors in rooms and corridors that promoted the philosophies of Vistamar's creators".[6]
Annual tuition for 2023-2024 was $47,514, with 33% of students receiving financial aid.[7] Enrollment in 2021-22 was 255 students.[3]
Christopher Bright is Vistamar School's third Head of School.[8]
Curriculum
The Los Angeles Times reported the curriculum is based on "Experiential education... to create more well-rounded students by translating 'nonacademic skills, habits and perspectives into academic achievement' -- in other words, learning from everyday experience."[9] At Vistamar, it includes "just about any extracurricular activity."[9]
Vistamar offers two foreign languages: Spanish and Mandarin Chinese.[10]
History
Vistamar School opened in September 2005, "following almost four years of research, planning, fund raising and personnel recruitment".[2][11]
Robert Lovelace, founder of the Los Angeles-based Value Schools, was a founder of Vistamar School.[12] Jim Buckheit, Vistamar's first Head of School, brought leadership experience from Anglo-American School of Moscow, Frankfurt International School in Germany, and the Common School in Massachusetts.[2]
Vistamar graduated its first senior class of 14 students in 2008.[13]
^"[ san pedro ... ]". Daily Breeze. March 18, 2005. p. A3. ProQuest338670285. Vistamar's founders hope to accommodate as many as 350 students in grades nine through 12 at the site, which was last leased by DirectTV. Tuition will be around $20,000, with scholarships available to those who qualify.
^ abcHannigan, Ian (September 6, 2005). "21st-century campus created in warehouse". Daily Breeze. ProQuest338737542. So far, construction crews have brought the entire building up to state education standards and renovated about one-third of the interior at a cost of around $3.8 million. The rest of the warehouse will be developed down the road as the school expands from its current size of about 60 ninth-graders and a handful of 10th-graders to a little less than 400 freshmen, sophomores, juniors and seniors in the years ahead.
^Hanigan, Ian (September 6, 2005). "21st-century campus created in warehouse". Daily Breeze. ProQuest338737542.
^Tremayne-Pengelly, Alexandra (June 6, 2023). "In Art News: Getty Trust Shake-Ups, Museum Bezos, 'Cheers' Auction". The New York Observer. ProQuest2822875660. Lovelace is the founder of the Los Angeles-based Value Schools and private high school Vistamar School. A prominent philanthropist, he also established the Center for Immigration Law and Policy at UCLA's School of Law...
^Leachman, Shelley (15 June 2008). "Worldly Grads". Dailey Breeze. ProQuest338880466. Three years after its doors first opened and some seven years since it was even conceived, Vistamar School in El Segundo has graduated its first senior class. In the Saturday commencement - an understandably short event, there being just 14 grads - the capped-and- gowned outbound Vistamar students were honored and applauded at Oceanside Fellowship Auditorium.
