Menlo School, commonly referred to as just Menlo, is a private college preparatory school in Atherton, California, United States. The school comprises a middle school, grades 6–8, with approximately 230 students and a high school, grades 9–12, with about 580 students. The middle and high school share a campus and have some overlapping administration, such as the Head of School.
Menlo was established in 1915 and in 1927, a junior college was added, which later became Menlo College. The college was formally separated from Menlo School in 1994, but the two institutions shared a single dining hall until 2017, when Menlo School built a separate cafeteria.
Menlo School is accredited by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges and is a member of the National and California Associations of Independent Schools.
Menlo's tuition for the 2022–2023 school year was $58,700, a 48.6% increase from the 2014–2015 school year.
History
Menlo School was founded in 1915 as the William Warren School, an all-male military school with an inaugural enrollment of 13 boys. Warren, the founder and headmaster, sold the school in 1924 to a group of parents, who dropped the military focus and formed a new corporation under the name Menlo School for Boys.
In 1927, Menlo became a non-profit governed by a newly created board of trustees. A two-year junior college, Menlo College, was created that year as an expansion of the school. During the college's early years, Menlo offered a hybrid prep school and junior college education. Students would attend the school for the latter two years of high school, then the college for two years, and then transferred directly into four-year universities as upper-division students.
In the fall of 1979, Menlo School began transitioning from a boys-only school with a small boarding program to a coeducational day school. In the 1993–1994 academic year, Menlo further moved to increase the upper school's enrollment, added grade 6 to the middle school, and further expanded its female enrollment.
The college and school were split on June 30, 1994, with further, more specific separations following. Menlo School and Menlo College became formally independent entities with separate boards, administrations, and faculties. In 2008, they further agreed to the formal legal subdivision of their hitherto shared land into two separate parcels. The only area of the campus that continues to be jointly owned and managed is the Menlo Athletic Quad, consisting of the athletic fields and track.
Following a fundraising effort that began in the late 1990s, both the middle and upper school campuses have been mostly rebuilt. The projects were completed in 1999 and 2004, respectively.
Student life
Menlo offers more than 50 student clubs in the Upper School and 25 in middle school. These include a chapter of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, Model United Nations organization, Junior Classical League, Surfrider Foundation, Mock Trial, beekeeping club, chess club, garden club, and environmental club. In total, the Upper School has over 50 clubs and affinity groups. Both the Upper and Middle schools have active student councils.
Student publications
The Upper School's student-run newspaper, The Coat of Arms, has won awards, including Top Honors – First Place with Special Merit from the American Scholastic Press Association. The Coat of Arms releases roughly six issues a year. It produces content for its online site and Instagram every few days. The current Editor-in-Chief is Tatum Herrin.
The Coat of Arms periodically publishes special editions on sensitive topics. In March of 2023, a special edition covering sexual assault and harassment contained a collection of articles about those topics, including survivor stories from students at Menlo's Upper School, as well as statistical information from a survey the school conducted about the prevalence of sexual assault and harassment in student's lives.
The Menlo Bard is a student-produced digital news magazine about arts and lifestyles. It has been around since 2012 and it is currently published semiannually. As of 2023, the Editor-in-Chief is Andrea Li.