Tag archives: Dunn School

The Memories and Masks of Sri Lanka
By Husna Balaven   |   January 23, 2024

This art piece was inspired by my trip with Dunn School’s winter term program to Sri Lanka. I experienced so many colorful sights, flavorful foods, and intoxicating smells on my two-week-long adventure overseas. I went sightseeing and on shopping trips; walked the steps of the oldest Dutch fort in Asia; saw fin whales on a […]

Dunn School
By Steven Libowitz   |   March 14, 2023

Dunn School’s Kalyan Balaven, head of school for the private co-ed college prep boarding and day school in Los Olivos, had no idea of the floodgates that would open when he decided to find a way to help a student from the Ukraine who early last year was initially only seeking a few extra days […]

The Locals Helping Ukraine
By Zach Rosen   |   May 31, 2022

While Ukraine can seem very far away and hard to help from here, these are some stories of local organizations and people that are helping Ukrainians both close by and afar.  ShelterBox USA For years ShelterBox USA has been helping communities in crisis around the world, even being nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize in […]

A Collaborative Mission
By Montecito Journal   |   May 24, 2022

On Saturday, May 7, Old Mission Santa Barbara and True Vine Bible Fellowship, Lompoc’s predominantly Black Baptist church, came together for an event at Old Mission in the name of unity. These two seemingly opposite churches have created a partnership that works to break down racial, gender, and class barriers and instead focus on emphasizing […]

New Dunn School Leader Reinvisions Santa Barbara County as Inclusion Lab
By Nick Masuda   |   June 3, 2021

Kalyan Balaven isn’t slated to start his job as Head of School at Dunn until July 1 — but it feels like he has been around for months. That’s because he has. He’s not only utilizing this time to acclimate his wife and two children to the area, but also establish a rapport with the […]

Developing Inclusivity and Community Go Hand-in-Hand
By Kalyan Balaven   |   May 6, 2021

Inclusion is not a special interest; it is a human right.  For the educator in me, this is a mantra that safeguards the term inclusion from how it trends currently in our discourse. In the rhetoric of our time, it has lost both its efficacy and meaning. It has become threadbare in its overuse and […]