Prominent Jesuit alumni issue new call to reverse co-ed decision, school holds firm
A group of prominent Jesuit High School alumni made a new appeal last week to reverse their alma mater’s decision to go co-ed, despite the plan to enroll girls being well underway.
The October announcement that the historically all-boys school would start accepting girls in fall 2027, citing financial challenges due to declining enrollment and an updated mission as the primary reasons for the change.
Under the new “co-divisional” model, boys and girls will be separate for most classes save for electives and more advanced coursework. Most co-curricular activities, like arts and leadership programs, would be shared, but spiritual programming and retreats would remain separate.
An impassioned group of parents and alumni has spent the last five months fighting to reverse the inclusion of girls, raging against what school leaders have repeatedly emphasized is a nonnegotiable final decision.
Continued attempts to ‘preserve tradition’ fall flat
As the school makes material moves to prepare for a co-ed 2027 class, a cohort of prominent alumni and donors continued their attempts to pressure the school to “preserve tradition” through an open letter to school leaders on Friday. Signatories include real estate developers Angelo Tsakopoulos and son Kyriakos, Julie Teel of the Raley’s family fortune and ice cream shop owner David Leatherby.
The group takes issue with what they call a lack of transparency and diligence around the decision-making of the board.
“No alumni support was solicited. No extended period of discernment with families and graduates who have sustained the school for decades. No independent feasibility study conducted by professional consultants. A change to the defining character of a sixty-year institution simply arrived, fully formed,” they wrote.
In the letter, the group re-upped their offer of $100,000 to the school to pause the transition for one year and conduct an independent feasibility study to see whether the change is necessary for the longevity of the school, which they claim the board has never done.
But school leaders have continually emphasized that the board has consulted several times with external partners on the matter beginning in 2022 and stretching though 2025, after which board decided that including girls would be “the most effective way to ensure Jesuit High School Sacramento remains vibrant, mission‑aligned, and able to uphold exceptional standards for students for generations to come.”
The Tsakopoulos family has also offered to match the $4.5 million in donations pledged through a Google form, amounting to $9 million total.
In a statement, Jesuit High President Chris Alling and Board Chair Kelly Brothers wrote that no individual or group has presented a formal donation proposal to the school.
“Jesuit Sacramento does not accept anonymous or conditional pledges, particularly when the terms conflict with the school’s mission, values and direction,” they wrote.
The road to including girls
In addition to the financial necessity of the move, Alling and Brothers both say that including girls aligns them more closely with the global 500-year history of Jesuit education.
“Welcoming young women to our campus reflects a core truth of Ignatian spirituality, which has always been for all people,” they wrote. “Education and formation will continue, as they have since our founding, to develop ‘Men for Others,’ and will now expand to form ‘Women for Others,’ remaining faithful to our commitment to the mission of the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits).”
Other alumni, including Joseph Baratta and Billy Downing, support the transition to the co-divisional model, giving the school a total of $3 million in unrestricted donations in the months after the announcement.
School personnel are already preparing for fall of 2027 — working to create a new academic schedule, developing operational procedures and hiring for girls’ varsity coaching positions. The school has also retained an architect to refurbish existing spaces that will be used by girls.
The school will begin an enrollment campaign this summer for the 2027 school year.
