Sequoia High School (Redwood City, California)

Updated on Dec 17, 2023

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Established 1895 Principal Sean Priest Age range 14-19 Phone +1 650-367-9780		Superintendent James Lianides Grades 9th-12th grade Number of students 2,143 (2015-2016) Mascot Raven

Address 1201 Brewster Ave, Redwood City, CA 94062, USA District Sequoia Union High School District Motto Place of Friends (UNALIYI) Profiles Facebook

Sequoia High School is a high school in downtown Redwood City, California, United States. Established in 1895, it is the oldest high school in San Mateo County. It was founded as a preparatory school for Stanford University. Today, it is one of the few schools to offer the International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma Programme within the Bay Area.

The present-day campus is located on the grounds of the former estate of Horace Hawes, author of the legislative bill that created San Mateo County. The grounds include a Japanese tea garden and is surrounded by a number of historical trees; the Giant Sequoia, Monkey-puzzle tree, Australian Tea tree, Ginkgo biloba trees, Cork Oak tree and many others. The school was added to the National Register of Historic Places as a historic district in 1995, under its former name Sequoia Union High School.

Sequoia High School is part of the Sequoia Union High School District.

On September 13, 2007 Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger visited Sequoia High School to sign bill SB 33, which prohibits persons who are under the age of 18 years from using a wireless telephone or other mobile service device while operating a motor vehicle.

Specialized programs

"Business/Information Technology Program": Sequoia's Business/Information Technology program consists of core business and technology courses designed to prepare students for exciting careers in business and information technology. These courses are available to all students and may be combined so that the program matches students' interests and goals. Business/IT provides students with advanced training that can lead toward industry recognized certification and community college credit. The program also provides students with marketable skills that can be applied immediately in the high tech workforce or built upon through higher education.

"Electronic Arts Academy": The Academy is a small school-within-a-school at Sequoia High School. The program is a School to Career Partnership Academy funded through a grant from the State of California that is matched by the district and industry partners. This grant is used to keep class sizes small, infuse curriculum with technology, provide extra support to students, and support hands on learning. Teachers in the Academy have time to meet and collaborate. This gives them the opportunity to plan cross-curricular technology rich projects to enhance learning. It also gives teachers an opportunity to identify students who need an extra push to take themselves to the next level and pool our resources to push them. The Academy provides a rigorous academic experience that focuses on helping students complete the A-G requirements to transfer to a four university. Students take four classes per year within the Academy: English, Science, Social Studies, and a Technology elective. The elective varies each year depending on the student’s pathway. Students have the opportunity to enroll in an SAT preparation course at no cost. Students can earn college credit through Cañada College for all technology classes in the Academy.

"Personalized Learning Communities (PLC)": Personalized Learning Communities at Sequoia High School provide a more personalized atmosphere for students and to ensure that all students receive the education they need. The movement toward personalized learning communities at Sequoia began in 2002. A team of teachers, administrators, and parents looked at three possible models for a house system. The Sequoia community ultimately chose the horizontal model, which is the model in place today. A team visited Nathan Hale High School, a school in Washington State that had already implemented the horizontal house system. They came back to Sequoia with observations, ideas, resources, and inspiration. During the 2003-2004 school year, the 9th grade houses task force met monthly at first, and gradually increased meeting time to almost weekly in order to plan everything necessary to implement 9th grade houses in the fall of 2004.

"International Baccalaureate Programme (IB)": Sequoia High School offers the International Baccalaureate Programme as of February 2002. The IB Programme is available to all students beginning of freshman year. The students are placed in ICAP classes their freshman and sophomore year before they enter IB classes as a junior and senior. Sequoia High School includes a wide range of classes for the students from English, History, Arts, Sciences, and Languages. The students are able to choose if they want to partake in the full IB Diploma which includes taking a Theory of Knowledge (TOK) class, an Extended Essay (EE) and doing Creative Active and Service (CAS) hours. For those who do not wish to participate in the IB diploma, the students can take the IB classes for certificates, if they pass the IB test. The International Baccalaureate Programme allows the students a wide range of opportunities because the course is worldwide. It prepares them for college as the course is rigorous, but helps each student adapt to the work load. At the end of the end year, similar to the AP test, the students take IB tests which go on throughout the month of May.

Demographics

2015-2016

2,143 students: 1,096 Male (51.1%), 1,047 Female (48.9%)

Notable alumni

Gary Beban: 1964 Heisman Trophy winner, briefly played professional football for the Washington Redskins.

Eric Dane (in school as Eric Feldman 1987–1990): Actor on Grey's Anatomy and Marley & Me

Ray Dolby: (1951) founder of Dolby Laboratories

Spencer Folau: (1991) 2000 Super Bowl championship with the Baltimore Ravens

Bob Gaughran: (1953) Member United States Water Polo Hall of Fame

James Gaughran: (1950) Olympic Water Polo Athlete, Melbourne 1956, Member United States Water Polo Hall of Fame

Tim Genis: (1984) Boston Symphony lead timpanist

Charles Johnson: professional basketball player for the Golden State Warriors

Steven G. Krantz:(1967) Scholar, writer, mathematician

Paul McClellan: Major League Baseball (MLB) player for the San Francisco Giants

Gordon Moore: (1946) Co-founder of Intel Corporation, best known for Moore's Law

Paul Noce: former MLB player with the Chicago Cubs

Kenny Ortega: (1968) director and choreographer for the High School Musical franchise.

William Royer: member of US House of Representatives

Dick Sharon: former MLB player

Dick Stuart: (1951) former MLB player with the Pittsburgh Pirates

Bob Svihus: (1961) Played with the Oakland Raiders and the New York Jets from 1965–1973

Tim Twietmeyer: Ultramarathon runner, best known for his completing the Western States Endurance Run more than 25 times in under 24 hours

References

Sequoia High School (Redwood City, California) Wikipedia

(Text) CC BY-SA

Contents

Specialized programs

Demographics

Notable alumni

References