.png){kind=logo}
Explore
Founders' Vision
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed it’s the only thing that ever has.
Margaret Mead
The nation, indeed the world, needs a school that will bring together children from many nations, many cultures, all races and religions, not simply to study and tolerate one another, but to learn from and celebrate their differences.
Hamilton Warren
Where It Started
Ham Warren didn't invent progressive education. He inherited it from some of the most remarkable minds of the 20th century — Margaret Mead, Clyde Kluckhohn, John Collier — and then built something lasting from it in the red rock country of Sedona, Arizona.
The idea was simple and radical at the same time: put students in real contact with the world. Not just books about other cultures, but actual relationships with them. Not a classroom version of nature, but 140 acres of it outside your door.
Ham was the visionary. Babs was the heart. Together they created a community that students didn't just attend — they belonged to.
Still True
Most schools evolve by adding things — more AP courses, more technology, more programming. VVS evolves by going deeper into what it already believes.
The five pillars Ham and Babs built the school around — intercultural understanding, environmental stewardship, service to others, physical labor, and community — aren't historical artifacts. They're the guiding principles that the school still runs on today.
Students still leave here knowing something about themselves that they couldn't have learned anywhere else.
-
-
-
Warren Kids Cropped2
-
Their Legacy
Ham and Babs Warren didn't just found a school. They founded a way of thinking about what young people are capable of — and what they deserve from their education.
That's the Founder's Vision. Not a mission statement. A living tradition.
Verde Valley School
Verde Valley School is an International Baccalaureate boarding and day high school for students in grades 9-12.
©2025 Verde Valley School. All Rights Reserved
Photo Credit to Arabella Media, John Sheedy, and others.
Photo Credit to Arabella Media, John Sheedy, and others.