Design Tech High School: Parent Guide to a Design-Thinking Public Charter High School

Design Tech High School, commonly called d.tech, is a tuition-free public charter high school in Redwood City, California, authorized by the San Mateo Union High School District and located on Oracle's campus. The school is built around design thinking, competency-based assessment, daily flexible learning time, and short intersession periods. It is a real public option for California students, but admission is capacity-limited and district-priority rules are central to how available the school is to a given family.[1][2][4]

Snapshot facts

Field	Detail
Official name	Design Tech High School.[3]
Current operating status	Active. The school publishes current enrollment pages and is listed by the California Department of Education as an active public charter high school.[1][3]
Founded	The San Mateo Union High School District page says d.tech was founded in 2014 and graduated its first class in 2018.[2]
Founding organization or founders	Current primary pages reviewed for this profile verify the founding year but do not provide a complete founder list. Secondary coverage names early leaders, but SchoolDecision should rely on school or district sources for final founder attribution if needed.[2]
Current leadership	The California Department of Education profile lists Dr. Ken Montgomery as principal/administrator and executive director for the 2025-26 profile year.[3]
Headquarters or primary location	275 Oracle Parkway, Redwood City, California.[3][4]
Campus or location footprint	One high school campus on Oracle's Redwood City campus.[3][4]
Grades served	Grades 9-12, with enrollment pages accepting applications for ninth through twelfth grade depending on space.[1][3]
Public, charter, private, or nonprofit status	Public charter high school authorized by the San Mateo Union High School District.[2][3]
Tuition or public funding model	Tuition-free and publicly funded. The school's FAQ says roughly 80 percent of funding comes from California's Local Control Funding Formula, with parent and community support and Oracle Foundation support for some activities.[4]
Admissions model	Annual charter lottery. Priority is given to students in the Sequoia Union High School District and San Mateo Union High School District, with other priorities and a free and reduced-price lunch weighting described on the enrollment page.[1]
Educational model	Design thinking, competency-based assessment, daily FLEX time, intersessions, and teacher facilitation.[4][5][6][7]
Evidence confidence	Strong for model, admissions, tuition-free status, and public charter status. Outcomes should be checked in CDE data and school profile materials before publication of performance claims.[3][8]

What it is

Design Tech High School is a public charter high school whose distinctive feature is design thinking. The San Mateo Union High School District describes d.tech as an innovative, free public high school, open to California students and authorized by the district. The district page also says Oracle Education Foundation selected d.tech to be the first public high school to have a new campus funded by a Silicon Valley company.[2]

The school should not be presented as a private corporate academy. Its location on Oracle's campus is unusual, and Oracle Foundation support is part of the public story, but d.tech remains a public charter school with state funding, an annual lottery, and public eligibility rules. The parent decision is therefore partly educational and partly practical: a family must determine whether the design-thinking model is a fit and whether the student has a realistic path through the lottery and priority categories.[1][2][4]

Educational model

The school describes design thinking as a four-year thread. Its design-thinking page says students begin with design thinking foundations, can pursue an Innovation Diploma, and may work as co-designers with industry partners. The same page lists design-related pathways such as product design, graphic design, game design, fashion and craft, and art and design.[5]

The instructional model also includes competency-based assessment and daily flexible time. d.tech's program page says students work at their own pace, teachers act as facilitators, FLEX time is built into the daily schedule, and students not on pace may be assigned to referral periods. The page also says assessment is competency-based and includes revision rather than a single one-time grade.[6]

Student experience

A d.tech student's day is more structured than a fully self-directed school, but less conventional than a standard high school bell schedule. The programs page says the student day runs from 8:45 a.m. to 3:35 p.m. and that the school has no bells. It also describes FLEX time as part of the daily rhythm, with teachers using referral periods to support students who are not on pace.[6]

The school also uses intersessions. Its intersession page describes three two-week exploration periods each year, during which students step outside the usual schedule for workshops, credit-bearing learning, and, for juniors and seniors, possible internships. Parents should ask how much choice students have in intersession assignments, which options reliably run each year, and whether internship access varies by student initiative or partner availability.[7]

Curriculum and instruction

d.tech is still a college-preparatory high school. Its graduation page says the school's graduation requirements meet or exceed the University of California A-G requirements. The same page says the school does not offer AP classes, while honors options and concurrent enrollment are available for juniors and seniors.[8]

That combination is important for parents. d.tech is not abandoning academic preparation, but it also does not signal rigor through the conventional AP catalog. Families comparing d.tech with a comprehensive public high school should ask how honors options are recorded, how college counselors explain the school's model to colleges, and how students demonstrate mastery in math, laboratory science, writing, and world language.[8]

Public, charter, private, or nonprofit status

d.tech is a public charter high school. The California Department of Education profile identifies it as a public high school, marks charter school status as yes, and reports 563 students for 2025-26. The San Mateo Union High School District page says the school is authorized by the district and open to California students, with a lottery when demand exceeds available places.[2][3]

The school's FAQ says d.tech is tuition-free and publicly funded, but also describes parent and community support and Oracle Foundation support. That is a common public charter funding mix, but families should ask about expected donations, transportation costs, device requirements, intersession costs, and whether any optional activities require fees.[4]

Locations and availability

d.tech is a single-campus school at 275 Oracle Parkway in Redwood City. The CDE profile and the school's FAQ both list the Oracle Parkway address.[3][4]

The school is not equally available to all California families. Its enrollment page says the school accepts applications from California residents, but gives priority to students in the Sequoia Union High School District and the San Mateo Union High School District. The school also describes lottery priorities for children of employees, founding-team families, siblings, in-district students, and free or reduced-price lunch applicants, with all other California residents placed after those categories.[1]

Tuition, admissions, and eligibility

The admissions page describes an annual lottery process. For the 2026-27 cycle, it lists application and registration steps and says grades 10 through 12 are accepted only as space permits. The page also tells prospective families to verify California residence and explains that students from outside the two priority districts may be placed on the waitlist unless higher-priority categories have been served.[1]

Families should verify the current year's lottery deadline, priority categories, sibling rules, and waitlist history. They should also ask about transportation. Oracle's campus location may be convenient for some Peninsula families and impractical for others, especially if students are not in the immediate district-priority area.[1][4]

Evidence and outcomes

The strongest evidence for d.tech is its public status, published enrollment rules, public CDE profile, and concrete school model pages. Those sources show a real school with a defined design-thinking model, not merely a branding claim.[1][3][5][6][7]

This profile does not make claims about student achievement, college persistence, or long-term outcomes beyond what the school and public agencies publish. Before final publication, SchoolDecision should check the California School Dashboard, school profile documents, graduation and college-going data if available, and WASC or charter renewal materials. If outcome claims are used, the profile should label whether they come from the school, CDE, the authorizer, or another independent source.[3][8]

Best fit

Design Tech High School may fit students who want a public high school with design thinking, project work, flexible time, and a smaller, intentionally designed school culture. It may appeal to students who like making, prototyping, and revising work, but who still want a high school transcript aligned to college-preparatory requirements.[5][8]

It may be a weaker fit for families who want a broad AP catalog, a large comprehensive high school experience, athletics or extracurriculars typical of a large district campus, or a school that is guaranteed by residence. Admission is lottery-based and priority-limited, so the school should be treated as a possibility rather than a plan until an offer is received.[1][8]

Questions parents should ask

Parents should ask which lottery category their student falls into, how many seats are likely for the target grade, how far waitlists moved in recent years, and whether transportation is available or family-managed. They should ask for a current sample schedule and a description of how FLEX time is supervised.[1][6]

Academic questions should focus on rigor and transferability. Parents should ask how competency grades convert to transcripts, how honors and concurrent-enrollment courses appear, how students do in college admissions without AP courses, and how the school supports students who need more direct instruction than a project or design challenge provides.[6][8]

Sources

[1] "Enroll," Design Tech High School, https://www.designtechhighschool.org/enroll, accessed June 7, 2026.
[2] "Design Tech High School," San Mateo Union High School District, https://www.smuhsd.org/community/design-tech, accessed June 7, 2026.
[3] "School Profile: Design Tech High," California Department of Education, https://www.cde.ca.gov/sdprofile/details.aspx?cds=41690470129759, accessed June 7, 2026.
[4] "FAQs," Design Tech High School, https://www.designtechhighschool.org/faqs, accessed June 7, 2026.
[5] "Design Thinking," Design Tech High School, https://www.designtechhighschool.org/design-thinking, accessed June 7, 2026.
[6] "Programs," Design Tech High School, https://www.designtechhighschool.org/programs, accessed June 7, 2026.
[7] "Intersession," Design Tech High School, https://www.designtechhighschool.org/intersession, accessed June 7, 2026.
[8] "Graduation," Design Tech High School, https://www.designtechhighschool.org/graduation, accessed June 7, 2026.