“I Actually Made Friends Here”: Inside Casa Pacifica’s Largest Graduating Class

As eighteen-year-old Sean waited for his name to be called at graduation, he scanned the audience for the staff members who had helped him reach this moment.

Just a few years earlier, graduating high school had felt out of reach.

After multiple group home placements, Sean arrived at Casa Pacifica struggling with anger and depression. School had become another source of frustration rather than a bridge to his future. But over time, the consistency of Casa Pacifica’s Non-Public School (NPS)— along with staff members who continued encouraging him even on his most difficult days — began to change that.

This month, Sean became one of 13 students to graduate from NPS, marking the largest graduating class in the school’s history.

For the students who crossed the stage, the milestone represented years of perseverance and support from teachers, paraeducators, therapists and administrators who helped them keep moving forward despite significant mental health challenges.

“Casa Pacifica helped me with many things but probably the most important was how to feel comfortable around other people. I actually made friends here, which I never had before,” Sean explains. “Once I felt more stable emotionally, it became easier to focus on school and think about what I wanted for my life.”

At NPS, education is closely connected to emotional wellness. Designed for students whose mental health and behavioral challenges have interrupted their education, NPS combines individualized academics with intensive social-emotional learning. Students work not only toward graduation credits, but also toward building coping skills, confidence, emotional regulation, and healthier relationships.

For Sean, that support helped him slowly become more engaged in school and more hopeful about his future. Today, he is preparing to attend community college, where he plans to pursue a degree in criminal justice.

“Watching students discover what they are capable of is one of the most rewarding parts of our work,” said Mark Capritto, Ed.D., Director of Education. “These graduates have overcome tremendous obstacles, and their success reflects not only their perseverance, but the power of providing a safe, supportive environment where healing and learning can happen together.”

For Lysa, 17, anxiety and self-doubt had long shaped how she saw herself, and she kept her world small and quiet. That began to shift when she started receiving music instruction at NPS, where an unexpected gift emerged—a natural talent for guitar she hadn’t fully recognized before. As she learned to play, something else changed too: her confidence grew, she began to open up to peers, and she discovered not just a creative outlet, but a new sense of possibility.

“Before this, I didn’t really think I was good at anything,” Lysa says. “But when I started playing guitar, it was like tapping into a fuller me.”

While each graduate’s journey looked different, many shared experiences of trauma, disrupted education, anxiety, depression, or instability that had made traditional school environments difficult to navigate. Their graduation represents not only academic achievement, but the result of individualized care, persistence, and a community committed to helping young people succeed.

This record-breaking graduating class represents more than academic achievement. It represents what becomes possible when a community refuses to give up on young people who are struggling.

Every diploma handed out this year is connected to someone who stayed—who taught, listened, encouraged, and returned the next day. And it is also connected to the donors who make that continuity of care possible.

Because of that support, students who once felt isolated are now talking about college, careers, and futures they can picture. What changed their trajectory was not a single moment, but thousands of small ones made possible by a community that chose to invest in them.

Sean and his clinician celebrate a milestone years in the making—high school graduation and a bright future ahead.