Bishop O'Dowd High School

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An O’Dowd education, among the finest on the West Coast, provides a college-preparatory experience that is profound in its impact, preparing students to achieve their goals and to create positive change in the most demanding and challenging era in history.

Uniquely located at a crossroads in the East Bay, O’Dowd offers transformative college-prep learning for a just, sustainable, and economically prosperous world. With 1,200 students and a supportive community rich in its diversity, we are just the right size to provide both new friends and extraordinary programs that challenge and support intellectual, moral, and personal growth. As you explore O’Dowd, we are confident you will find:

• Highly effective teaching and learning that prepares students academically and socially for the best colleges – as reported by returning graduates.
• Broad and deep academic and co-curricular programs anchored in Catholic values that promote intellectual excellence, the strength of character, resiliency, and spiritual wisdom.
• An unmatched focus on sustainability, experiential learning, and social justice that nurtures kinship with creation through the Center for Environmental Studies and the surrounding four-acre Living Lab.
• An authentically diverse community that fosters social intelligence and self-confidence.
• Teachers who skillfully incorporate technology to enhance student learning and motivation.
• Excellence in athletics, campus ministry, debate, and performing and visual arts that nurtures teamwork, creativity, growth, and joy.
• Intensive student support for all kinds of learning styles – and aspirational counseling that encourages independence and self-confidence for thoughtful college and career choices.

Several excellent schools in the Bay Area share such characteristics, however, few can offer the entire constellation of elements that ensure our students become the positive change-makers so needed in the world of today and tomorrow. We encourage you to talk with members of our community about their experiences and invite conversations with you about your children.

Bishop O’Dowd High School is a Catholic college-preparatory community, guided by the teachings of Jesus Christ, that educates its diverse student body to build a more just, joyful, and sustainable world.

Our educational mission is rooted in our Catholic heritage and our success is built on the partnership of students, staff, parents, the community, and the Diocese of Oakland. O’Dowd’s academic, spiritual, and co-curricular programs develop exceptional graduates who communicate Christ to others and enrich society through Gospel values and how they live their lives.

A “charism” is a gift of the Holy Spirit and a set of spiritually inspired core values. At O’Dowd, our inclusive charism, “Finding God in All Things” calls us to the community in diversity, the strength of character, academic excellence, kinship with creation, social justice, and joy.

Each year, school and student leadership strive to achieve this vision of an O’Dowd community enlivened, challenged, and animated by the spirituality and values of our charism. While giving preference to Catholics, we welcome students of all faiths who embrace our mission and contribute to it.

At Bishop O’Dowd High School, sustainability is deeply ingrained into all aspects of the school. Programs are built with a clear vision for what sustainability is and how it connects to our Catholic identity. O’Dowd uses the Four-Cs Sustainability Framework to guide our approach to making our CAMPUS and operations more environmentally friendly infusing sustainability into our CURRICULUM engage the COMMUNITY and integrate sustainability into our overall CULTURE.

O’Dowd’s campus houses a Living Lab and Center for Environmental Studies. The lab features a four-acre certified wildlife habitat and outdoor classroom committed to reconnecting students with the natural world and developing a kinship with Creation. Educators often talk about dissolving the walls between the classroom and the real world, and the Living Lab is a place where this is happening every day.

Academics at O’Dowd challenge the intellectual capacity of our students and prepare them for college success. Required coursework is complemented by a wide variety of electives. Freshmen take seven courses each semester. Sophomores and juniors follow a core curriculum enhanced by courses in visual and performing arts. In addition, juniors and seniors choose from a wider range of electives including Advanced Placement and honors course options as well as independent study.

We understand that students learn just as much outside the classroom as inside, so Bishop O’Dowd High School offers a wide range of engaging trips and tours to stimulate our students’ minds. We also require all students to participate in our service-learning program, in which students will gain a personal understanding of social justice and our Catholic call to reach out to those on the edges of our society.

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