Alternative Family Education
Santa Cruz · Santa Cruz County · Santa Cruz City High · Public
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Most similar nearby schools
Delta Charter → Slvusd Charter School → Costanoa Continuation High → Renaissance High Continuation → Diamond Technology Institute → Compare all similar →📋 At a glance
- ✅ Dual-enrollment program (college credit while in HS)
- 🔢 1 calculus classes · 1 physics · 1 chemistry
- 🎓 AP rigor: Bottom 33% of US high schools
- 🎓 4-yr grad rate: 90% (Bottom 49% of US high schools by 4-yr grad rate)
Composed from federal CRDC offerings, EDFacts ACGR, and other public data. Full breakdowns below.
How Alternative Family Education compares for families
What families should know about Alternative Family Education.
- ▸ Locally📘 Top 8 in Santa Cruz County on ELA proficiency — plus 1 more top-rank.
- ▸ vs Similar SchoolsThe closest comparables nearby: Delta Charter, Slvusd Charter School, Costanoa Continuation High and 2 more. See the sidebar to compare side-by-side.
For Parents
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🎓 Academic rigor
AP + advanced-course offerings
Moderate — some AP / advanced course access
Bottom 33% of US high schools
Source: federal Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC 2020-21). CRDC reports what's offered + enrolled — it doesn't collect AP exam pass rates (College Board owns that data and doesn't release it school-level).
SAT / ACT participation
CRDC federal data · 2020-21Source: federal Civil Rights Data Collection (CRDC 2020-21). Volume — not score — is what's reported here. A higher count means more students at this school are entering the college admissions pipeline. Note: 2020-21 was COVID-disrupted; some districts (especially those that stayed remote longer) report unusually low or zero takers.
🎓 4-year graduation rate · federal EDFacts
What % of students graduate on time?
Bottom 49% of US high schools by 4-yr grad rate
Source: federal EDFacts ACGR (Adjusted Cohort Graduation Rate), 2019 vintage via Urban Institute. EDFacts publishes a range (low-high) to preserve privacy on small cohorts; we display the midpoint.
🏛️ Federal Title I context
Mixed-income school
Below Title I eligibility threshold (FRPL < 35%)
25-34% of students qualify for free/reduced lunch. Below the federal Title I threshold but a meaningful share of the population is income-eligible for free lunch.
Source: NCES Common Core of Data, free/reduced-price lunch eligibility. The actual Title I designation is a district decision and may differ from eligibility — but the federal eligibility math is what we show here. We don't claim to assert whether the district formally chose to enroll this school in Title I.
Student composition — 2025-26
HS grades 9–12 racial/ethnic composition and program subgroups, from CDE Census Day Enrollment. Two-year shift shown when ≥1 pt — surfaces how the community served has changed since 2023-24.
Race / ethnicity
Program subgroups
Source: California Department of Education, Census Day Enrollment 2025-26 (HS grades 9–12). Δ shown when shift is ≥1 pt since 2023-24. Categories below 0.5% omitted.
Chronic absenteeism — 2024-25
Share of students missing 10% or more of expected attendance — the leading indicator that often precedes the demand decline shown above. Families disengaging tend to raise absenteeism first, then formally leave. Basis: grades 9–12.
Absenteeism is up 4.9 pp since 2016-17. A rising absenteeism trend often precedes formal departure — worth investigating which subgroups are driving it.
Source: California Department of Education, Chronic Absenteeism 2024-25. Benchmarks limited to non-virtual public & charter HS with ≥100 eligible students. CDE didn't publish a usable 2019-20 file (COVID).
Enrollment trend & projection
If this trend holds (-1.7%/yr, Total enrollment)
At per-pupil funding of $ / student:
| Horizon | Projected Total enrollment | Change | Funding impact / yr |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 yr (2027) | ~121 | -2 | $0 |
| 3 yr (2029) | ~117 | -6 | $0 |
| 5 yr (2031) | ~113 | -10 | $0 |
Straight-line extrapolation of the recent annual rate — a what-if, not a forecast of intent. Default = California's LCFF base grant for grades 9–12 ($12,423/ADA). Edit the figure to match your school.
Alternative Family Education — Enrollment & Outcomes Snapshot
Public · Santa Cruz · vs. 10 most similar nearby schools
- ▸Senior-class enrollment is down 62% (13→5 from 2018 to 2026), trailing the peer-group median of -13%.
- ▸At its recent rate (-0.5%/yr), enrollment projects to ~121 by 2029 — about 2 fewer students than today.
Enrollment projection
That's about 2 fewer students. At per-student funding of $ per student, that's roughly $0 in annual state funding at risk.
Default = California's LCFF base grant for grades 9–12 ($12,423 per ADA) — adjust to your district's actual per-pupil figure. Projection extrapolates the recent annual rate — not a forecast of intent.
Your school vs. its 10 most similar nearby schools
| School | Type | Size | UC Reach | Enroll. trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alternative Family Education | Public | 123 | — | -62% |
| Peer-group median | — | -13% | ||
| Delta Charter | Public | 114 | — | -29% |
| Slvusd Charter School | Public | 110 | — | +76% |
| Costanoa Continuation High | Public | 67 | — | +0% |
| Renaissance High Continuation | Public | 82 | — | -32% |
| Diamond Technology Institute | Public | 89 | — | +200% |
| Boynton High School | Public | 132 | — | -38% |
| Broadway High | Public | 147 | — | -17% |
| Mt. Madonna High | Public | 141 | — | -43% |
| New Valley Continuation High | Public | 117 | — | -10% |
| Santa Cruz County Career Advancement Charter | Public | 235 | — | +390% |
UC Reach = top-6 UC admits ÷ senior class (can exceed 100% when students are admitted to multiple campuses). Enrollment trend = first-to-latest grade-12 change on file. Similar schools matched on proximity, size, type. Methodology →
Enrollment stability & demand — 2024-25
Two complementary signals: retention (do students stay once enrolled?) and demand (are families choosing the school?). Read against the Santa Cruz County baseline — the demographic tide is moving every CA HS, so a school's gap vs. county is the actionable signal.
Enrollment -61.5% vs. county +3.1% AND stability (70.7%) below the county median. Recruitment and retention both under pressure — likely a foundational rather than tactical problem.
17 of 58 students who enrolled at Alternative Family Education this year didn't maintain continuous enrollment (29.3% non-stability). Mid-year transfers, dropouts, and other exits are all counted.
Stability by student group
Nearest peer high schools
Source: California Department of Education, Stability Rate 2024-25. Benchmarks limited to non-virtual public & charter HS with ≥100 cumulative enrollees so by-design-high-churn continuation schools don't dominate the bottom of the distribution. Cumulative enrollment counts every student on the rolls during the year, so it can exceed peak-day enrollment.
Campus Breakdown — 2024
| Campus | Applicants | Admits | Enrollees | Admit Rate | UC Reach | Yield | Avg GPA (App) | Avg GPA (Adm) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UC Berkeley → Elite | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| UCLA → Elite | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| UC San Diego → Selective | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| UC Santa Barbara → Selective | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| UC Davis → | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
What This Means
For School Admins
The full Reach Report for Alternative Family Education
A board- and LCAP-ready intelligence brief: your enrollment retention and college outcomes, benchmarked against your closest competitors, with a 5-year forecast, concrete steps to act on, and the rigor + outcomes story you can share with your families. Built from primary public data — prepared for you, not auto-generated.
- ✓Your 5-year enrollment forecast (currently -1.7%/yr) with the revenue at stake
- ✓Student-retention benchmarking vs your county median — and the LCAP evidence to back your goals