Sage Hill School is a non-profit and non-religious private college-prep high school in Newport Beach, California. It is also rumored to be inspiration for the popular TV show "The OC".
It opened in 2000, with approximately 30 sophomores and 125 freshmen. The first graduating class was therefore in 2003, and today the school has an approximate student population of 500. It is known throughout Orange County for the oppulence of some of its students as well as for how nice the buildings are. The principal, Mr. Wilkins, is a graduate of Harvard University, and numerous financial contributors to the project have gone to ivy leagure universities. These financial contributors routinely send their children to Sage Hill School, who then go on to attend ivy league schools. While intended to be a West Coast counterpart to East Coast college-prep. boarding schools, Sage Hill is not filled exclusively with genius rich kids. A fair share go to less prestigious universities, and some use California's community college system in order to transfer. Despite this, Sage Hill still stands out as having a high rate of acceptance to the countries most prestigious universities and small liberal arts colleges (schools Sage Hill advocates highly).
Sage Hill School was built on approximately 40 acres (160,000 m²) of Native American ground, though they did so with the blessing of the tribe that they bought the land from. The construction costs were in the tens of millions of dollars, and tuition is in the tens of thousands for each student (those that are not receiving aid). Even so, the school is expected to run at a net loss each year, even after being fully built. It will rely on additional donations. Class sizes are generally small, and it offers many advanced courses not offered in nearby public schools, excepting University High in nearby Irvine.
Though not known for sports, the school has many good facilities, including a large gym, a baseball field, and (planned for the future) a swimming pool, which is impressive for a school of such size. Though originally, all buildings were slated to be completed by the first half of the decade, the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the corresponding downturn in the stock market had an effect on slowing down the rate of donations the school received. As a result, some building projects are still not completed.
Sage Hill School faculty are overwhelmingly liberal, while the community and most of the student body's parents are overwhelmingly conservative. The student body tends towards the conservative side, though not all of the privileged students agree with their parents politically. The faculty attempts to accurately represent the ethnic makeup of Orange County in the student body, and though this has shown results, it has not been completely successful.
The school has its share of drug problems, "problem" youth, and other issues endemic to American schools, but compared to other high schools, Sage Hill School has very few of these problems.
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Last updated: 08-30-2005 17:10:53
