Vidya believes in a well-rounded, liberal arts education that addresses every discipline within the traditional humanities. Our life-skills curriculum, moreover, complements this with an emphasis on entrepreneurship, technology, finance, and engineering. We want our graduates to be masters of all trades. As such, our graduates will have a natural tendency to be entrepreneurs or leaders in multidisciplinary fields.

Our diverse community speaks too many languages for Vidya to offer. Vidya does not believe it is appropriate to offer just one or two languages (as in public schools) and force students to learn them to meet state’s foreign language requirements. Instead, we will work with parents so that students can take UC-approved courses from a wide selection of languages available either online or at a local community college.

The real estate and facilities required for competitive athletic programs contribute significantly to the cost of operating a school. As a new school with limited resources, we will not be participating in CIF-sanctioned athletics in our early years. We will encourage students to participate in local youth sports organizations and will provide appropriate academic credit for doing so. Additionally, basic physical education, health and fitness courses will be offered on campus or at a partner facility as part of our life-skills curriculum.

Each student will be given a laptop (1:1) at the beginning of their 9th grade – devices that they will keep through completion of high school. Each laptop will have all the necessary software installed – Microsoft Teams, Word, PowerPoint and Excel, OneNote and Canvas (or equivalent). At the end of each year, laptops will be returned to the school. The laptops will be inspected for continued use, the hard disks will be wiped, software reinstalled, and returned to students at the beginning of the new grade. We believe most students will have access to laptops, desktops, tablets, or internet-connected TVs at home. Consequently, there will be no need for students to take home the school-provided laptops, increasing the probability that laptops will be in good condition for four years.

We also believe every student will likely have a smartphone. Instead of curbing or limiting phone use in classes, we will embrace the use of smartphones and emphasize proper and respectful use of them.

Vidya is not yet accredited. We will be accredited by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC). One of their conditions of eligibility for accreditation is that the school “be in at least the second semester of operation, with students, teachers, and administration in place.” Full accreditation will be in place by the second year of operation (SY 2022-23). Our leadership, and Maker Learning Network staff, are highly skilled and have been through this process many times.