Seven Arrows Elementary has seven days between its final building inspections and the first day of school, and families of 154 enrolled students are watching the calendar.
The independent school, displaced from Pacific Palisades by the January 2025 wildfire, must vacate its current Clover Campus at 2800 28th St. after a developer notified administrators in summer 2026 that the site will be demolished for a 390-unit apartment project. Final inspections at the new campus, 3420 Ocean Park Blvd. in the Sunset Park neighborhood, are scheduled for Monday, Aug. 24. School starts Monday, Aug. 31.
It will be the school's third Santa Monica location in 18 months.
"It was a huge surprise for us," Director of Enrollment Management and Communications Victoria Lerner told the Santa Monica Sun. "From our perspective, we had three years."
Staff had signed only a three-year lease at Clover and suspected redevelopment was coming, but believed they had time. Instead, the school scrambled to find a replacement site around the corner.
A community tested by fire
About 50% of enrolled families lost their homes in the Palisades Fire, according to founder and Head of School Margarita Pagliai. Enrollment dropped from roughly 180 students to 113 in the fire's aftermath before recovering to 154 expected for the 2026-27 year.
After the fire destroyed its original Palisades campus, Seven Arrows first reassembled at the Boys & Girls Club in Santa Monica, then split students between that location and the Venice Boys & Girls Club, before reuniting the full community at the Clover Campus in April 2025. There, staff converted about 20,000 square feet of unused office space into classrooms and built an outdoor yard.
The move
Professional movers will handle the relocation. Pagliai's goal: classrooms installed by Tuesday, Aug. 25, freeing teachers for professional development and room preparation before the Monday, Aug. 31 opening.
The Ocean Park campus will have a similar footprint to Clover, plus a second floor and new outdoor play areas. Landlord BXP Properties is funding much of the conversion, according to the Sun.
Pagliai said delaying the first day of school was never considered. After COVID closures, the fire and repeated displacement, she wants students back in a structured environment on time.
Santa Monica for the long haul
Pagliai and the school's board have decided Santa Monica will be Seven Arrows' permanent base for roughly a decade, estimating that Pacific Palisades could take 10 years to return to pre-fire conditions.
Pagliai told the Sun the school now considers Santa Monica home. The City of Santa Monica helped Seven Arrows navigate its Conditional Use Permit and inspections on an accelerated timeline, she said.
Seven Arrows will maintain a Palisades connection through Aldersgate, a historic 1920s building it owns that survived the fire. The school is converting it into a science center and plans to shuttle students there for programming.
Classes begin Monday, Aug. 31 at 3420 Ocean Park Blvd.
