A Santa Barbara Unified School District
school that is free to all K-8 children in the district.
4025 Foothill Road
(At back of La Colina Junior High Campus)
Santa Barbara, CA 93110
(805) 683-3127
Call for a tour appointment
Principal
E-mail: Ms. Alex Tashma
School Vision: Open Alternative School (OAS) was founded in 1975 to provide a child-centered holistic educational experience that nurtures the mind, body and spirit of each child. The OAS philosophy recognizes and supports each child as a unique individual while helping them develop a broad range of skills and attributes needed in a democratic society. A solid academic program is key for acquiring essential knowledge and skills and is backed up by an instructional approach that supports children in becoming intrinsically motivated and responsible for their own learning. The OAS community strives to live by our collective values, modeling and integrating these values in all facets.
In the classroom: Teachers create a nurturing atmosphere where children feel supported to take developmentally appropriate risks while developing academic competency and intellectual capacity. Traditional academic curriculum, like math, language arts, social studies and science are often integrated into projects, field trips and outdoor experiences making these subjects meaningful and relevant to student’s lives. Group projects provide opportunities for collaboration, leadership, and problem solving. Multi-cultural understanding, environmentally sensitive practices and global awareness are cultivated through special programs. An open classroom policy, where parent volunteers provide regular classroom support, raises the adult-student ratio giving teachers the ability to create exciting and effective teaching strategies to enhance student learning.
Service Learning Projects: Civic engagement, human dignity, social justice and responsible citizenship are explored through service learning activities. Throughout the year, students engage in a variety of activities designed to teach personal empowerment, community service and environmental or political activism. Feelings of hope, inspiration and empowerment are essential for creating a healthy and positive global outlook for today’s children.
Theater, Music And Art Program: Theater Arts encompass several core values of the OAS community and provide amazing opportunities for children to develop self-confidence, poise, ownership of responsibility and teamwork skills. Every class puts on its own musical play with help from professional directors. Students and parents are involved in every part of the process, from choosing the play to developing characters, memorizing lines, learning choreography, building the stage and collaborating on costumes. OAS encourages field trips to allow classes to attend theater and musical performances in the community and also brings to campus artists, musicians, poets, storytellers and dancers to teach and perform for students.
Outdoor Education: Central to the OAS educational philosophy is to give children educational experiences in their natural world to build respect, understanding, meaningful connections, self-confidence, and personal responsibility. Annual camping trips (2nd –8th grade), Day in the Park in celebration of Earth Day, field trips to natural and cultural preserves, whale watching, and Astrocamp for 6th graders provide a rich variety of experiences for our students.
Organic Garden and Healthy Lunch Program: OAS is a pioneer and a leader in the use of organic gardening as an innovative instructional tool to teach science, health and nutrition. The OAS garden employs Organic, Biodynamic, and French Intensive techniques. Students regularly participate in the garden, and the garden activity is readily incorporated into all areas of the curriculum. The produce grown is used in the healthy lunch program, and provides seasonal snacks and unusual art projects.
Social-Emotional Learning: OAS uses innovative programs such as Core Group and Peer Mentoring to focus on building a caring inclusive community. Children learn tolerance, compassion, and respect while seeking diplomatic solutions to conflicts. Through open discourse, children are empowered to think creatively, ask questions, speak with integrity, look at issues from a variety of viewpoints and support one another’s personal development.
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