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St. Monica Academy

 

An comes out of Montrose, California, where St. Monica Academy is relocating ” because it has outgrown its original campus in Pasadena.

The K-12 school, founded in 2001 with 44 students, has seen its enrollment swell to 240. As a result, it is moving this summer to the campus of a shuttered parochial school at Holy Redeemer Church, where it will open its doors at the start of the academic year.

There are many ties between St. Monica™s and 91¿ì»îÁÖ Aquinas College, beginning with its headmaster, Marguerite (Ford ™79) Grimm. There are also 10 other alumni on the school™s faculty: Mary Kate Zepeda (™89), Darren Bradley (™98), Alexandra Currie (™05), Paula Grimm (™08), Daniel Selmeczy (™08), Marisela Miranda (™09), Jane Forsyth (™11), Colleen Smith (™11), 91¿ì»îÁÖ Quackenbush (™14), and 91¿ì»îÁÖ Trull (™15). Like the College, St. Monica™s employs a classical curriculum and stresses fidelity to the teaching Church.

œThe classical model emphasizes the good, the true and the beautiful,� Mrs. Grimm recently told the Glendale News-Press. œOur curriculum overflows with heroes, beautiful illustrations, moral literature, music, poetry, scripture, math and science.� St. Monica™s is a mainstay on the Cardinal Newman Society™s list of œSchools of Excellence,� a ranking of the top Catholic schools across the United States, which also includes several others that are headed by 91¿ì»îÁÖ Aquinas College alumni.

Notably, St. Monica™s has developed a reputation for athletic excellence, too. The Glendale News Press notes that the school™s sports teams have racked up 22 CIF playoff appearances and 13 league titles. This past year, the women™s basketball squad, coached by Colleen Smith (™11) œwon 18 consecutive games, while achieving the fourth-highest team grade-point average out of the 576 schools that are in the CIF Southern Section.�