Great school! Superior academics, and a small close-knit community. The best Catholic High School in Ventura county. read more

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Every experience in life is relative - and in that sense, relative to the Ojai Valley and Ventura County in General, Villanova Preparatory School remains your best bang-for-the-buck in private high school/prep-school education. The class sizes are small and there is still a cap on the number of students who may be admitted. The campus is absolutely beautiful, much like a small college, and there is an abundance of open space. The facilities are steadily (albeit slowly) being upgraded and improved upon, and the safe, quiet environment certainly promotes a sense of peacefulness and promotes learning. Through review of recruiting literature it's obvious that the school enthusiastically promotes it's International Baccalaureate (IB) Degree program which was put in place a few years back. And while this program may be of some value to international students (and a very small number of domestic students) it seems to be more of a "prestige marketing ploy" geared toward the well-off parents of foreign students who pay a ton of money to educate and board their children at VPS for 4 years. The bottom line is that although taking IB classes (or obtaining IB certification) may "look impressive" on a students college admission application, it's next to meaningless to the vast majority of United States based colleges and universities. These institutions would much rather see "AP" or "Honors" on that high school transcript next to the course title.....not "IB". Unfortunately, being such a small school with a small staff, VPS didn't have the capability to do both, and chose to phase out it's AP and Honors programs as it went "all-in" with the IB program. This, unfortunately was a huge disservice to those American kids who were / are likely to attend an American-based college or university that could honestly care less about IB. For a such a small school, there are many athletic options within which to participate, and there is an abundance of academic, service and social clubs run by students and overseen by a chosen faculty member. VPS is both a day and boarding school, with approximately a third of it's students living on campus. Most of these students are foreign nationals from around the world, and this obviously brings an interesting and engaging dynamic to the to the prep-school experience - not unlike college. These students share their culture and are readily immersed into the VPS community and ultimately become part of the family for life regardless of where they may go in the future. Many lifelong international friendships occur as a result. This love of sharing, acceptance and diversity in the Augustinian tradition has been happening at VPS for decades - long before the toxic "cancel-culture" and "woke" extremism we see today. In general terms, the VPS faculty and staff are quite qualified. And being blessed with smaller class sizes and motivated students, they will routinely out-perform their peers elsewhere. In all fairness, a handful of the teachers are absolutely phenomenal - some wearing multiple hats as teacher, coach, advisor, etc. There are of course a small minority of teachers and staff who seem to have a personal agenda beyond that of educating the students and preparing them for the real world. Determined to find a "racist" hiding behind every tree and united in their hatred of America, our military and the police...they form an increasingly vocal element devoid of truth and honesty, but full of parroted phrases and slogans. The obvious hope is that this too will pass, and that both the headmaster and the Board will keep the stupidity in-check. read more

As a student who attended this establishment for all 4 years, and participating in most opportunity offered i can give a review from experience and a lot of in depth research. I came from an all public schooling, and i have to say that in Ojai, CA Villanova is better than any other school, or at least was the first few years. The in class schooling is the best i have been provided, but the out of class faculty interactions almost cancel out what is good. The administration is a joke and runs the school to THEIR desires. Most upper echelon faculty members have very low mental capacities and jump to yelling and intimidation to handle students. From the headmaster, to the president, to the Director of student life, the majority of the employees are horrid. My last year of school here was wretched. From the perspective of a day student, i would say that the in class teaching was 9/10. There were only one or two teachers who needed some help. All of the core classes were wonderful, and the spanish department was very good as well. Also, even though the school is not known too well for its drama department, the drama teacher and play advisor is as good as it gets. The history teachers were all wonderful and did top teaching jobs. The science department is wonderful as well. Math was good, but since the administration had its way with changing around the teachers, it looks grim. One very fine teacher, one of my favorites, only stayed for his one year contract and then left solely because of the bad job and intimidation of the administration. I had a few good mates who were dorm students, and besides the outlandish pricing, the dorms are pretty good. Some of the staff has some problems with communication and there are a lot of complaints with the food. Overall my experiences were very mixed. My first few years i enjoyed going to school and learning, but as time went on and the administration declined and put its hand in more parts of the school, the school declined in quality as well. I would say if the current administration stays in charge, the school should be avoided at all costs to future students and parents interested. But if your student/child can stay tough throughout the bullying and intimidation set on by the administration and truly keep on track with the curriculum and wonderful teachers, this is a great Preparatory School and truly prepares students for college. read more