The Episcopal School of Los Angeles

At ESLA, we abide by a straightforward truth: The best educational tool for any young person is the collaboration and camaraderie of peers from different backgrounds—peers who have stories and perspectives to share, the stuff of life that cannot be gleaned from a textbook. A truly exceptional, transformative education requires a diverse and equitable learning environment. It gives students access to entire worlds and worldviews they might never otherwise encounter. It opens their hearts and minds to the concerns, struggles, and joys of others—knowledge that will forever shape their convictions and actions in life.
Study after study shows that students from diverse classrooms have more significant cultural competencies and are better prepared for higher education and life beyond. But this is about far more than college prep. At ESLA, diversity, and equity are not buzzwords or window dressing. They are irreplaceable pedagogical practices and—moreover—ethical imperatives. Breaking down the barriers in our society goes hand in hand with breaking down the barriers in our schools, and preparing tomorrow's ethical leaders requires ethical educational practices—right now, today.
At ESLA, almost half of our overall tuition revenue is funded by need-based scholarships—an enormous, nearly unparalleled commitment to aid and access in the independent school world. We cannot overstate what an incredible difference this makes.
Every year we enroll just as many students who know what it means to live in the most trying financial circumstances—students whose convictions are forged with a visceral understanding of economic disparity in our nation and whose perspectives are therefore vital—as we do students who come from significant affluence.
A majority of our newly enrolling students identify as people of color. Our families reflect our neighborhood's vibrant diversity and our city—small business owners, studio executives, wage workers, Latinx, Korean-American, black, and white. In a fifteen-year seminar class, our average class size is often the case that no two students will approach the issue at hand from the same socioeconomic and cultural background.
It is also quite telling that several of our most popular, student-founded, and student-led organizations are the Feminist Club, the Gender and Sexual Diversity Association, and Bridging the Gap. This club facilitates lunchtime conversations on issues about marginalized groups. Many of our students are openly LGBTQ. Many contend every day with the complexities of intersectional identity politics—what it means, for instance, to be multiracial, to fit into predefined categories rarely, or to experience privilege in specific ways but persecution in others.
Our students lead the way in bringing our mission to life. They repeatedly prove, through their curiosity and courage, innumerable versions of that simple truth we abide: If you want to have a transformative conversation about immigration policy in the US, you have to do it with DREAMers or the daughters of immigrants in the room. If you want to have a transformative conversation about gender and sexual identity, you have to do it with LGBTQ students or LGBTQ parents' daughters in the room. The absolute best resource our students have is one another. Everyone has much to give and much to learn. This is lofty rhetoric, we know. We are just one small school, growing every day, doing our best. The path ahead of us is long, but we walk it with determination, and we hope our story resonates with yours.
Our mission is what we are made of; it provides the building blocks for our entire school. We aim to foster a safe space where the most talented students from all walks of life can receive an education of unrivaled quality, space where their differences will often recede into the background as they engage in intellectual, artistic, and athletic pursuits—and space, too, where they can address their differences on an equal footing, where they can contend with tricky questions in a familiar spirit, with generosity and with joy. Everything we do is in service of this goal.
We understand the value of carving out some space in a young person's life that's free from technology—free from text messages, video games, social media, and glowing liquid crystal screens. This is why our students put away all outside technology while they are on campus to focus on the school day and interact face-to-face with faculty and peers.
But we also understand the incredible opportunities for integrating technology into our classrooms and our curricula. We believe that technological literacy—the ability to navigate both the potentials and perils of our rapidly evolving, tech-driven era—is an essential education component today. The school provides every student with a Chromebook and all the software they will need for class and ensures that everyone has a reliable internet connection when they go home each evening.
Moreover, our campus allows our students to engage with the tools that will undoubtedly shape their futures—from high-powered desktops to robotics equipment, virtual reality goggles, and 3D printers. These are not merely expensive toys. We want our students to ask broader questions about how technology shapes the ethical landscape of the world they live in and how it can be harnessed toward positive social transformations.