Meet Marlene Dandler | Seashore Academy Founder and CEO

We had the good fortune of connecting with Marlene Dandler and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Marlene, Let’s talk about principles and values – what matters to you most?
Empowerment. I want to provide parents with options and the freedom to design a customized experience for their children’s education. Too many schools are a one-size-fits-all model where the schools determine what is best, leaving the parents with little say. Homeschooling is freeing, but without structure or standards of quality, can be an intimidating jump for many parents seeking educational choices. Coming from an empowered perspective fundamentally changes the educational journey as we speak about “choices” and children learn by experience that people can make choices and not have to follow the dictates of the herd.
I also believe in freedom of medical choice, so Seashore families make their own medical decisions for their children free from dictates imposed by the state on private, charter, and district schools. I belive families and their medical providers should make these decisions and it shouldn’t be imposed by the school.

Alright, so for those in our community who might not be familiar with your business, can you tell us more?
What sets Seashore Academy apart is that everything is built from a client’s perspective. I designed it for my own use, and for my own children, and I continue to think about it from a parent’s perspective. When I delegated too much control to top private school leaders I hired, the business actually took a downturn and I had to step back in. They were experienced leaders who were NOT focused on parents’ satisfaction; one instead focused on the minutiae of curriculum and the other focused on the financials. That proved to be disastrous so our restructuring puts families, including focusing on each individual child and also parental communication, squarely at the center of what we do.
“Families First” is our focus. We prioritize family educational choices and provide them the freedom and flexibility to customize their child’s schooling experience, 1-5 days/week. Offering academic and entrepreneurial classes, the curriculum is designed for life success in multiple fields. By teaching entrepreneurship, financial management and public speaking, our offering is unique. With a strong academic foundation using pencil & paper (no Chromebooks or tablets!), Seashore’s children learn to think critically and engage in dialogue.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
I’d take them on an electric boat ride of Newport Harbor, where they could see sea lions, all the sailboats and yachts, and cruise through the waterways. We’d eat at a local seafood restaurant for dinner before heading home. We’d wake up and hike the Crystal Cove Beach trail, where we’d see whales off the coast and smell the fresh scent of wild sage. We’d visit Sherman Gardens and head to the OC art museum.
We’d also spend a day hiking the El Morro Canyon trail, overlooking the Pacific Ocean, and eating at the restaurants at the bottom of the trail overlooking the ocean. We’d go to a show at the Segerstrom Center for the arts, shop at a local outdoor mall, visit the San Juan Capistrano Mission, and walk through the old historic district. We’d eat at family-owned Mexican, Vietnamese and Thai restaurants and enjoy the beautiful weather.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
Rich Dad, Poor Dad was a paradigm-shifting book for me, as it made me question traditional schooling altogether. That, and Angela Lee Duckworth’s TED talk on the importance of instilling grit in children, helped me realize that traditional schooling didn’t provide any real skills for life success. I started questioning the importance of good grades and blindly following the school system and instead started designing the important core tenants of strong fundamentals for life: strong values, grit, financial management, public speaking, entrepreneurship, and critical thinking. Of course, I still wanted my children to have a strong academic foundation in the basics (reading, writing, and arithmetic!). Inspired by the homeschooling community in Orange County, I developed a hybrid model.

Website: www.seashoreacademy.org

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stories/seashore_academy_/3172827524539723329/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mdandler/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@seashore_academy