This Fall, Aspire opened four new campuses, adding 1,000 new students to the Aspire network – a growth of over 25 percent. Aspire now has 18 campuses in the Bay Area, Los Angeles, the Central Valley and Sacramento. At almost 5,000 students, Aspire is now larger than 760 of the 1,000 public school districts in California.

In Los Angeles, Aspire expanded by opening two new campuses: an extension of Antonio Maria Lugo Academy, a K-3 school located in a former parochial school building, and Aspire’s first Los Angeles secondary school in a new building on Saturn Avenue, starting with grades 4-6 and eventually expanding to become a full 6-12 secondary school. Both schools are located in the historic city of Huntington Park, six and a half miles southeast of Downtown Los Angeles.

Aspire’s new elementary campus serves approximately 150 students. Led by veteran Aspire principal Vicky Perez (who has relocated from Modesto), the new school will immediately benefit from AMLA’s enthusiastic parent community.

Maribel Galan, who opened AMLA as founding principal, will be at the helm of Aspire’s as-yet-unnamed new secondary school on Saturn Avenue. The school serves approximately 360 students in grades 4-6.

In Stockton, Aspire opened a new campus with the support of California State University-Stanislaus, which is delivering Aspire’s college preparatory program to approximately 120 students in grade 4-6. Kevin Taylor, former lead humanities teacher at Wilson Prep in Oakland, is principal of the school. The campus is currently chartered by Stockton Unified as a satellite of Rosa Parks Academy; as the students move into the secondary grades, Aspire will seek an additional charter to serve 400 students in grades 6-12.

And in East Palo Alto, Aspire started a program to serve students in grade nine who came from the phenomenally successful East Palo Alto Charter School (EPACS). Eventually, the EPA 9th grade program will also expand to become a full secondary school serving students through twelfth grade in East Palo Alto. The program is led by Tom Madson, former vice principal of EPACS.