Newbury Park Adventist Academy History

Accredited by the SDA Board of Regents (1951) and a charter member of the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (accredited 1962), the school's average enrollment is currently 125. Its teaching staff number 12 full-time, 2 part-time and 4 classified staff members. Address: 180 Academy Drive, Newbury Park CA 91320, telephone: 805-498-2191, Fax 805-199-1165.

Following the closing of the old San Fernando Academy in 1923, the Southern California Conference maintained an interest in establishing a boarding school in a rural setting. It purchased land near Oxnard which it sold about 1937. Finally, in 1945, the conference committee purchased 135 acres traversed by U.S. Highway 101 at the southwest edge of Conejo Valley, and called Frank E. Rice, a graduate at Stanford, to become principle-manager of yet-unnamed school.

Elder David Voth (Conference President) had formulated a plan to let young people from the city live in a rural setting, study a college preparatory curriculum and become vocationally proficient, all with a Christian atmosphere.

Mr. Rice put together a staff of professional teachers with unique vocational activities. One such man was Elder Ray Alderson, Commissioned to direct and develop the total vocational program. His inventive genius set up a sophisticated poultry operation with a high level of production and efficiency, all the while teaching the Bible classes and pasturing the school church.

School opened in September, 1948 with minimal buildings. Over dug, 39 faculty homes and 4 small apartments were built. In keeping with the vocational emphasis a laundry, a broom/mop factory pedigreed dairy herd was acquired. The excellent farm produce as well as the maintenance service personnel and equipment kept the school a prominent factor community of Newbury Park for 20 years. After the Highway became a Freeway, an Equestrian Center was developed but by 1983 the demographics had shifted, necessitating Ventura County, Constituency day school.The academy is in possible transition to be rebuilt on the back portion of the existing 457 acre site.

Principals: Frank E. Rice, 1948-1956; Laverne W. Roth, 1956-1966; Herbert B. Wilcox; 1966-1968; Benn Nicola, 1968-1972; E. Edwin Nelson, 1972-1981; Stan Baldwin, 1981-1988; Harold Crook, 1988-Present

A coeducational day school on the senior high school level situated on U.S. Highway 101 in southeastern Ventura County, 45 miles northwest of Los Angeles, in Newbury Park, a community within the city of Thousand Oaks.