student life

Upper School students will have the opportunity to help shape their experience at Redwood Day School. With classes starting at 9 a.m., to honor the natural biorhythms of teenagers, our students will enter the school day refreshed, relaxed and ready for the day ahead.

Our daily schedule will include seven 70-minute class periods rotating over a six-day block schedule. There will be ample time for students to mentally recharge between classes by meeting up with classmates, spending time reviewing for an upcoming test or quiz, or simply sitting quietly on a grassy knoll. Each student will have a free period allowing them to meet with teachers for extra help, to form small study groups with classmates, or to plan the next club activity.

While most student clubs will be formed based on student interest, there will be several clubs that are essential to upper school life. Student government, Honor Council, and affinity groups are vital to ensuring an enriching experience for all students. Our community is one in which differences are celebrated, and where all students are included in the fabric of daily life. Each student club will have a faculty member who will serve as a sponsor and support base.

Diversity
While our students and faculty are diverse in many ways, it is very important that all members of the Upper School be valued for who they are and what they bring to our community on a daily basis. Our work with diversity and inclusion principles is present in our two-year humanities program for grades 9 and 10. In this program, students learn about the role that successful communication, cultural awareness, and differences play in the development of governmental policies, treatment of others, and the unique relationship between the powerful and the powerless while examining ancient and modern societies.

Another area where our focus on diversity appears is in our Life Planning curriculum. Beginning in sophomore year, students will devote an entire quarter devoted to in-depth examination of the ways in which privilege and access manifest themselves in society. Students will develop the skills necessary to effectively recognize imbalances of access to power, understand the cause(s) of these imbalances, and design approaches to successfully address the imbalance.

Our upper division electives will include courses that provide students the opportunity to study academic works covering a wide range of subjects that illustrate a deeper understanding of diversity and inclusion. Students will be required to apply sociological theories and anthropological approaches to broaden their scholarly analysis of the coursework.