Our Vision:
To raise a new generation of courageous, thoughtful, and Christ-centered leaders to create a more just and inclusive world.
Our Mission:
To inspire students to become ambitious, joyful, and deeply engaged leaders in a quickly changing world.
Our Core Values:
Christ-Centered Community: A shared journey of transformation – moving from self-centeredness to self-sacrifice, from self-interest to a personal commitment to the greater good, guided by Jesus Christ’s life and teachings.
Diversity and Belonging: Building a welcoming school, honoring every individual’s inherent dignity. John Lewis’s words also resonate deeply with us: “If you come together with a mission, and it’s grounded with love and a sense of community, you can make the impossible possible.”
Joy, Hope, and Engagement: Encouraging humility alongside excellence, fostering genuine engagement.
Service and Hospitality: Cultivating care, trust, and community to prepare students for lives of meaningful service. As Theodore Roosevelt wisely said, “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”
Our Leadership
Executive Director & Professor of Psychology at Mills Institute at Northeastern University
PacBay Board President / Director of Networks and Improvement at Baylor University
VP / Director, Business & Entrepreneurship at Valley Christian Schools
PacBay Board Treasurer / Head of School at Windermere Preparatory Academy
California Foundation for Christian Education and Pastoral Ministry
2024 Graduate Reel
Our Story
Our Identity: A Story of Courage, Redemption, and Transformation
At its heart, PacBay community dedicates itself to academic excellence, joyful learning, and the staunch pursuit of truth, justice, and beauty. And, our journey is one of redemptive transformation, courageous renewal, and intentional growth, and we are unafraid to tell our story to all who will listen.
Our story, recounted below, was also told in ESPN’s Undefeated publication. As our nation continues to grapple with its history and continued insidious and overt presence of racism, our story offers a vision of what is possible – humbly calling out the wrong, standing up for what is right, and charting out a common path to uplift our shared humanity on this side of heaven.
Our School History
Leading up to 2018
In the spring of 2018, a team of leaders began transforming a Bay Area school with a problematic history tied to a white supremacist namesake. This was the start of a new chapter, confronting the past and reimagining the future. By July 2018, the school emerged as PacBay, a newly incorporated school embodying a name, identity, and redemptive vision of inclusivity and global citizenship, welcoming students from diverse backgrounds to become the whole persons God intends them to be.
2018 to Present: Key Milestones
- 2018: We launched three key initiatives
- Developed a six-week (one day a week) outdoor education program emphasizing holistic growth where students challenged themselves with activities like surfing, mountain biking, and hiking, as they connected with nature, learned new skills, and bonded with peers.
- Developed a partnership with World Vision’s Ignite program, a service-learning and global citizenship initiative where Dr. Chen played a key role in conceptualizing this with World Vision;
- Created a robust college counseling program led by an experienced counselor to guide seniors toward college readiness.
- 2019: Expanded our high school academic program with 36 new University of California (UC) approved courses, developed by our talented faculty.
- 2020: Navigated the initial year of the pandemic successfully:
- Successfully transitioned to virtual and hybrid learning during the pandemic supported by extensive training and family engagement, maintaining over 90% approval rating, and returned as one of the first Bay Area schools to receive county approval for a safe return to campus.
- Further expanded our academic program by adding 52 more UC approved high school courses, four major studies tracks, six world languages, and enhanced counseling services to address the social emotional challenges during the pandemic.
- Phased out our elementary school due to declining demands for private elementary education in the area.
- 2021: Operated safely on campus throughout the pandemic; completed a new cross-country trail on school grounds.
- 2022: Achieved audit-ready financial status.
- 2023: Completed our first financial audit.
- 2024: Celebrated our sixth graduating class with a 100% acceptance rate to four-year universities (a first in PacBay history), including acceptances to prestigious schools such as Ivy League institutions, UC Berkeley, UCLA, and more.
PacBay’s transformation reflects the dedication of our Board, administrators, faculty, staff, families, and students. As Professor Jon Eckert from Baylor University noted, “The changes at Pacific Bay Christian these past few years have been transformational… PacBay is an entirely different school today than it was when our work began in 2018” (Eckert, June 2022).
Our Redemptive Name
There is power in a name. The naming process for this new school was intentional and deliberate, covered with prayer. Our new school’s name needed to lay the foundation for a community of strength, character, justice, and faithfulness. And so this name was chosen:
Pacific: The campus overlooks the majestic Pacific Ocean, and that western horizon draws our eyes beyond ourselves to embrace a global perspective. PacBay would not embrace insularity, exclusivity, or eliteness. Rather, it strives to nurture in each student a perspective of inclusivity and global citizenship, championing a unified vision of humanity.
Bay: While keeping an understanding of the importance of a global perspective, we are also rooted in our local community. PacBay opens its doors to the entire Bay Area, welcoming students from a diversity of backgrounds, beliefs, perspectives, and lived experiences.
Christian: From its very founding, PacBay aspires to be a part of God’s redemptive story. Christ is at its center from an ecumenical standpoint, bringing together all Christ-centered viewpoints and denominations in its community. PacBay aspires to live out “mere Christianity” by welcoming all as Christ and emphasizing love and unity as integral to the Christian faith. It aims to be a sanctuary where all students can flourish and come together to learn, pushing themselves towards excellence and towards becoming the whole persons God wants them to be.
Our Transformative Vision
Pacific Bay Christian School is committed to continued and courageous growth. At the heart of its academic mindset lies the desire to nurture all students in virtue, leading them towards a love of truth, justice, and beauty. PacBay is dedicated to educational innovation and looking at conventional systems from fresh and unique perspectives. We see this throughout the curriculum and the structure of the school day, from their Flex Days to their Outdoor Education program. And, PacBay animates its commitment to equity through its culminating senior seminar, where every senior explores issues at the intersection of their life’s pursuits with faith and justice.
PacBay takes its identity, its history, its name, and its vision seriously: it continues to further the narrative of joyful renewal by nurturing virtue in its students and pursuing justice and equity in all it does. Above all, its vision is one of unity: where students of all backgrounds work alongside the staff and faculty to cultivate their academic environment together. As students graduate from PacBay and go out into the world, may they be empowered with boldness and virtue to change it for the better, and fight for truth, justice, and beauty.