Greetings from Silicon Valley International School (INTL). We have been formerly known by a few other names, depending on where and when you attended, but the beauty of our school is its continual evolution, building the strongest possible international and bilingual education in Silicon Valley.

The Office of Advancement is responsible for the school’s fundraising, community building, and alumni relations. We have the honor of being the school’s advocates for goodwill, spirit, and philanthropy. This page serves as an update to Alto, GAIS, and DAS alumni on the merger, the school, where we are now, and where we’re headed.

This merger was many years in the making. In 1993, German American International School (GAIS) approached ISTP to discuss how both schools could benefit from multicultural and multilingual synergies. 

In 1998, GAIS reached out again to discuss the possibility of a merger. While both schools’ values and missions aligned, the lack of space prohibited a successful merger at that time. Over the years, it became increasingly clear that a union would mutually benefit both schools, and in 2019, the schools formally discussed a merger, with the original intent of first merging the high school and then merging the remaining divisions over the following years. However, in 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic influenced a more expedient merger, and after much strategic planning and work, the two schools merged together in less than a year, creating the premier bilingual International Baccalaureate (IB) World School on the West Coast.

We are excited to be a larger and stronger school, with more language programs, expanded offerings, an additional Upper School Language Acquisition program for those with no prior bilingual experience, and the full continuum of the IB Programme, from the Early Years Program to the Diploma Programme. Together, our school has 688 students with a $7mil+ endowment as of June 30, 2021.

Already, our students are benefitting from our first year together as one school (2021-2022).

Our logo—which was designed in 2020 for the school’s new name and identity as Silicon Valley International School—is a modern homage to the globe, simply represented by intersecting circles of land and water tilted at 23.5°—the angle of the earth’s axis. The overlapping circles come together like two languages in a bilingual education, and now, like two extraordinary schools and communities.

Coming a long way from Peninsula French American School’s earliest mascot, Arthur the Elephant (the nephew of the beloved children’s books, Babar), the school’s new mascot is Indy the Dragon. Inspired by Alto International School's former mascot, dragons are strong, resilient, and wise. They are found in mythology and traditions across cultures all over the world. In 2020, we invited students to participate in a dragon naming contest, and an interesting connection was found amongst the submissions. Both Jordan, 1st grade Chinese Program from INTL, and Noemi, 2nd grade German Program from Alto, had the exact same idea: They both wanted a name that represented "international." Since the unveiling, our whole community has displayed such enthusiasm and excitement over INDY the Dragon.

We are connecting with alumni from Alto, GAIS, and DAS/GAS, and we have spent the last summer working with former and current Alto faculty and staff to build an alumni database. We have data from the last five years, but much is outdated from earlier years. We welcome you to reach out to help us build up this database of alumni and families from Alto, GAIS, and DAS/GAS.

Contact Us

You will always be welcomed to join us at events:

We hope you can join us at all alumni events (all alumni and past parents are invited):

We know that many parents formed lasting friendships during their time at the school, and we additionally organize the following alumni parent gatherings in Silicon Valley:

We welcome your contributions and continued commitment to the school, as well as your patience, as we navigate this exciting time of growth together and continue to reach out to our alumni community. 

We hope that you will join us at one of the events mentioned above, or engage with us in one of the following ways below: