A charter school focused on computer programming and game design has been given the green light to take over a middle school in the Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District.
The board, in a unanimous decision Tuesday evening, Dec. 12, OK’d Orange County School of Computer Science’s plans to take over Bernardo Yorba Middle School in Yorba Linda.
OCSCS was granted a five-year term that begins July 1, 2024. Then, Bernardo Yorba Middle will be converted into a charter school that can accommodate 600 seventh and eighth-grade students.
At the end of those five years, the charter school anticipates serving up to 1,000 students, and the contract could be extended for the charter to continue operating.
Students who reside in the Bernardo Yorba boundary area will automatically be enrolled in OCSCS unless they want to transfer. In that case, they can apply to attend any middle school in the district, said Superintendent Alex Cherniss.
Admission preferences will be given to students in the Bernardo Yorba area and those from feeder elementary schools Fairmont, Glenview, Glenknoll and Woodsboro. Priority will be given next to siblings of current students, children of employees, middle school students in PYLUSD but outside Bernardo Yorba’s area and, lastly, students outside the district.
Several informational meetings and “shadow days” — where prospective families can learn more about the curriculum given by OCSCS administration — are planned over the next several weeks. At these meetings, questions about transportation, curriculum and overall concerns will be addressed, said Beth Fisher, the Bernardo Yorba principal and lead petitioner for OCSCS.
The school plans to utilize the “Code to the Future” curriculum, an instruction outline that focuses on programming and game design, what its creators say are “21st-century skills.”
Through history, math and science, “Code to the Future” teaches students life skills under the umbrella of…
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