A 6-week program that gives self-driven high schoolers what high-performers have that others don't:
Genuine self-knowledge, real execution skills, and a strategic plan built around who they actually are -- so every application, decision, and opportunity gets their best.
The Missing Piece
School builds credentials. It doesn't build self-knowledge, strategic thinking, or the practical skills of high-performers.
82%
of managers say Gen Z lacks needed soft skills
Source: Harris Poll
56%
of high schoolers report persistent sadness: 20yr high
Source: CDC
55%
of teens hang out with friends 2+ times weekly (20+yr low)
Source: Atlantic
The research is clear: what predicts long-term success and fulfillment isn't grades or credentials -- it's self-knowledge, strategic thinking, and real execution skills. School wasn't designed to build any of these. Designing High School was.
Adult Development
Self-knowledge and relationships predict success and wellbeing more than grades or status.
The philosophy behind the social fitness and relationship-building work in Designing High School -- and the reason self-knowledge comes first.
Life Design
Design thinking -- the methodology behind the world's best products -- applied to building a life.
Draws on the design thinking tradition pioneered at Stanford's d.school -- reimagined for the teenage years in Designing High School.
Stixrud & Johnson
Autonomy and internal motivation -- not parental pressure -- produce resilient, successful adults.
The research behind the self-direction and execution skills curriculum in Designing High School.
The Element
When teens discover what they're built for, everything -- including academics -- gets easier.
The inspiration behind the values, strengths, and career exploration work in Designing High School.
The skills that change how your teen shows up -- in every room, every application, and every opportunity that matters.
Which parent are you right now?
"My teen has time -- but no real direction yet."
They're capable. You can see it. But right now they're reactive -- moving from class to class, activity to activity, without a thread connecting any of it. No particular sense of who they are, what they want, or what kind of life they're actually building toward.
This window -- before the college prep clock starts -- is uniquely valuable for building real skills: goal-prototyping, self-direction, economic reasoning, social confidence, the things school skips. Most families let it pass without realizing what's possible.
"The applications are coming. Does my teen know their own story?"
The pressure is already here -- APs, SATs, college lists, essays. But underneath all of it, something foundational feels missing. Your teen is working hard and still can't answer the question every application eventually asks: who are you, really, and what do you want?
Self-knowledge isn't soft prep. It's what makes every essay specific, every interview honest, and every decision land with conviction -- because it's grounded in real execution skills, career clarity, and values-based thinking. Not just good intentions.
Both programs start in the same place: a real conversation about who your teen is becoming -- and what they actually need to get there.
A teen who knows where they're headed -- and the execution skills to get there.
Live Saturday sessions plus weekly async modules on the MPA learning portal. Rising 11th and 12th graders, Bay Area, Summer 2026. Application-based, intimate cohort.
All sessions, workbook, portal access & 1:1 coaching
- 7 live Saturday sessions -- 60-min orientation + 6 core sessions of 90 minutes each
- Weekly async learning modules on the MPA portal -- personal finance, career & major exploration, AI-enhanced research, social confidence
- Strategic 4-year academic & activity plan -- built by your teen
- Student OS Workbook -- weekly execution system built on frameworks used by peak performers, adapted for teens
- Teen mindfulness curriculum -- stress regulation, focus, and the inner practices of high-performers
- Personalized strengths, values & archetype profile
- 1:1 coaching session -- parents welcome
- Personal strategy presentation to cohort -- Week 7
Built by a Practitioner
The students MPA has worked with — and the districts — share a similar challenge: the potential is clear, but the path forward isn't.
Neil Dandavati founded MPA because he'd seen that challenge up close, in a San Francisco classroom. The life design course he developed there won a national teaching award and scaled to 15 Bay Area schools and more than 2,000 students a year through a partnership with the Pearson Foundation.
Since then he's carried the same framework further, advising Alameda County district leadership on long-term planning, and leading strategy and operations at an early-stage AI company. The context changes. The work is the same.
That work is what Master Plan Academy is built on. The students and districts we work with leave with more than just a plan — they leave with the clarity and confidence to act on it.
I especially valued the clear, practical strategies for college admissions and the way you made the activities and digital tools engaging.
— Parent of 10th grader, Alameda, CA
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