<p>Along those lines of great hockey program ... Salisbury.</p>
<p>As an entering junior, you should cast a wide net. There are not a lot of incoming junior spaces, so you'll need to look at many schools.</p>
<p>Oh, hell, I might as well plug for NMH (always do). My son is not a hockey player, and NMH's hockey team has not been amazing the past few years, but I believe they are building...and the head coach is new. They are a member of the Division I New England Prep School Ice Hockey Association (NEPSIHA) which is generally regarded as the best high school hockey league in the country.
They evidently have "state of the art ice" (I am not a hockey person so I have no idea what that means). The building which houses the arena is not nice and is not even completely enclosed. NMH realizes this is something that needs to change and they are in the process of completely renovating the Mt. Hermon campus. The new arts center is nearing completion, groundbreaking will begin on the new admissions building in June, and they are currently working with an architect to build a NEW RINK, new pool, gym facilities, and additional athletic fields.
NMH is often considered a "safety" (not so much this year, I think). For some reason, they lack the "name prestige"....and it eludes me as to why because I am quite familiar with those other schools and can't find an area where NMH is lacking in comparison. Could be that they are about 100 years newer than the other schools and never relied on blue-bloods or "old money" when they first got started. On the contrary, they were the first school to admit an african-american and openly supported all minorities long before it was chic to do so. The school's founder, Dwight L. Moody, believed that every bright, aspiring young person deserved the type of education reserved only for the elite rich at schools like Exeter and Andover. Hence, Mt. Hermon, had more than its share of students from poor farm families. No names like Rockefeller to add prestige and big bucks. Anyway, that is just my theory.
They probably have more slots open for juniors than most....the student body is about 620 and they start with only 100 freshman and add students each year. It can be misleading, as they do have post-grads (although I was told that they are decreasing the number of PGs they admit) and it is not uncommon to repeat the junior year (especially for athletes). I can assure you the academics, faculty and course selection are all top notch. They have excellent matriculation stats....more LAC then Ivy. They do have several hockey players continuing in college this year. The AD (has only been there two or three years) was a professional hockey player in the Calgary Flames and Pittsburgh Penguins systems and has 19 years of coaching experience. He is also the head boys coach.
This school is easier to get into than Exeter/Andover, but I can assure you offers an excellent bs experience. Check it out.</p>
<p>Keylyme - you should get yourself a job as an admissions officer at NMH and do the recruiting circut.</p>
<p>Haha....no kidding, huh? It's awful, I am so biased.</p>
<p>All the admins are biased - you'd be perfect.</p>
<p>NMH was the first place I thought of when D said she wanted to go to BS. I left the decision up to her, however, and was happy when she included it among those to which she chose to apply. I kept an open mind throughout and visited her other choices too. But it came back to NMH and I couldn't be happier about it (unless you cut the driving distance from home in half). Less prestige as defined on CC, perhaps. But a great fit for my D.</p>
<p>I wish you would stop talking about NMH -- I want to be able to get my child in next year. Everything I hear about NMH makes it sound better and better. Now, please keep it quiet until after my child receives an acceptance letter.</p>
<p>:) Plantfan. </p>
<p>There are many good schools out there and all it takes is a few dedicated posters extolling the schools virtues, so that people learn about them. Example: Keylyme & Dr Nancy for NMH, Burbparent & MomofWildChild for Blair. My daughter was accepted to 4 schools that are rarely mentioned on this board: Holderness, Canterbury, The Gunnery and Proctor. All are great schools with a caring community. There is a "right" school for every child. Not everyone fits into the Andover/Exeter mold. I hope more parents and kids continue to post about the lesser mentioned schools. (Although, as you say, recently there are as many posts about NMH as there are about Andover.)</p>
<p>Laxi - Thanks a lot for the advice, you've really given me some good ideas. While I may have made myself out to be fairly uninterested I am in fact very passionate about history and English. I do love hockey, and I think your suggestion to create and/or donate money to a scholarship for kids is a great way to be noticed. The main reason I said I'd be willing to give up hockey (believe me actually doing this would be a very hard decision to make) is because I feel at this point I don't have a lot of options.</p>
<p>Ok, we all know that Keylyme is the #1 proponent of NMH on CC. I post this to provide a prospective from an "outsider" and not someone who has a child at the school. My kids went to other boarding schools in NE that are considered "top tier". The only reason I know anything about NMH is that one of my nephews will be attending next year and I have learned about the school through that process.</p>
<p>I predict that Northfield Mount Hermon School will be considered one of the top 10-12 boarding schools within the next fours years and here is why: </p>
<p>1) The consolidation into a single 1,100 acre campus has lowered the student population from 1,100 to 600. In reducing the number of students and focusing the school's resources to a single campus, the school becomes more selective, SSAT & SAT scores go up and college matriculation (already good) more closely mirrors peers in the "top tier". In other words, all the data that perspective parents/students initially consider from Peterson's and BSR, etc., will steadily and rapidly improve to "top tier" levels. This is already happening now. We all know reported data on these sites is generally old news. For the "top" schools, it hardly matters because their stats don't change very much from year to year. For NMH, the updated data will change radically. When this year's data is compiled and updated, NMH's acceptance rate will drop from 51% to somewhere in the high 20s to low 30s and average/median SSAT scores will go from the mid 70s to mid 80s. SAT scores will also rise 100-150 points overall. This is already happening now and will continue improve over the course of the next four years. </p>
<p>2) The NMH "product" is one of the best kept secrets in boarding school education. Next year ('08-'09) will be the second year of the semester "block" scheduling, a wildly successful academic structure that mirrors how most courses are taught in college and provides for three major courses per day with classroom periods of 90 minutes each. This gives teachers/students far more time to completely cover each subject in depth in a single classroom period. The NMH faculty are fantastic, enthusiastic and very professional, but rather than spend a lot of time comparing to other schools, for the sake of this post suffice it to say they are as fine a faculty as you would encounter at other "top tier" schools. The faculty, in combination with a rigorous and very effectively unique (for boarding schools) academic structure will propel the academic "benchmarks" even further than just the net effect of reducing the student body and refining school resources. </p>
<p>3) NMH is distinctly positioned as an alternative to the "traditional" prep school experience. Much like the Andover experience compares and differs from the Exeter, SPS or DA experience, NMH offers top academics with a less formal structure/dress code, etc.,allowing students to make more choices, while providing an excellent student support infrastructure that schools like A/E lack (I have personal experience with both), as well as all the bells and whistles (in many cases even more) than the "top" schools. </p>
<p>4) NMH has one of the most beautiful campuses (much bigger with greater natural resources than A,E,D,H,etc), with top-notch academic facilities, buildings, sports facilities and the newest and by far the best Music & Arts Center in NE. All for the enjoyment of 600 very lucky kids. The constant and continual upgrades to this already well endowed campus will be a driving component of an already constantly rising pool of applicants each year.</p>
<p>5) NMH is in the process of "ramping up" their communications & marketing and will have a much greater presence in the boarding school "marketplace" than ever before. A new Director was recently hired and more resources are being directed to these efforts. The campus consolidation and subsequent academic/enrollment/facility adjustments had to be made and fine tuned first. Now they are all in place and working magnificently.</p>
<p>All in all, It is my opinion that NMH is THE boarding school in NE, who's "position" in the most common boarding school "rankings" will most dramatically change within the next 2-4 years for the reasons stated above. The school is in a great position and the flash point for all this change relates back to the campus consolidation that was implemented in 2005. This was a complicated and well executed strategic plan within the Board of Trustees which was finally adopted (after endless debate I am told) in 2004. The benefits to the school/faculty/students and parents are and will continue to be enormous.</p>
<p>Anther fan of NMH here -- we did hours and hours of researching schools, including some top 10. In the end, NMH was where my son wanted to attend.</p>
<p>I think prepdad has some excellent (and true) observations. I would add that the NMH endowment has also been increasing and they are able to offer solid FA packages to kids they really want to matriculate. That ability will also help propel them into a "top tier" school.</p>
<p>Now I need to join the chorus of "YEE-HAH!"s for NMH, although neither of the Smile Pups ended up going there.</p>
<p>We know the AD well and he is one of the most spectacular people you can imagine. He is one of those (extremely) rare hockey coaches who hasn't lost perspective in the drive to put together a competitive team. He knows what he is talking about when it comes to talent and development, and he honors his commitments to his recruited athletes. This is not always the case in the rarified world of prep school hockey. He is a gem and I'm sure the NMH athletic program (and the hockey team in particular) will benefit from his leadership.</p>
<p>Walden12-
I wouldn't completely take out the, what some may say, "more elite schools", from the equation. Exeter and Andover both have two of the highest student populations (around 1000 each), which means that there will be more open spots for any sophomore applying for their junior year. I know that Exeter had somewhere around 40 available spots for the applying junior-pool this year. That I know of, at least two sophomores were admitted to Exeter for next year (myself included--hence the reason why I am playing-up Exeter more). Good luck, and just be yourself-regardless of what you, or someone else may think is right!</p>
<p>these are what i've heard are good:
groton, exeter, andover, sps, lawrenceville, middlesex, hotchkiss, choat, although i'm sure there are many other good shools, and one of them will suit you. you have a year, do some research.</p>
<p>Honestly, I would start building your list by finding schools that have hockey teams (since that seems to be your interest/passion/possible hook). don't rule out any schools at the start. Once you have a nice list of schools that offer hockey at your level and above, you can start looking at other factors -- there are plenty of schools that offer hockey, so you will be able to find a nice mix of matches, low reaches and high reaches in that group.</p>
<p>In order to find those schools (and I am not a hockey person) try googling "boarding school hockey" and also try posting another thread here on CC "looking for Boarding Schools that offer Hockey". Don't rule out a school, even if it is further from home than you think you want.</p>
<p>This is from experience-
PLEASE do not procrastinate.
I am a professional procrastinator,
and the Asian stereotype is that you have to do well on the ssats, that is all that matters <-- NOT TRUE
i spent all of my time studying for the ssats, and it paid off, and i got a 97%
however, my grades dropped considerably, as i spent 3 days of my week at ssat prep classes from 5-11 pm, and did not have any time to do homework or study for tests.
And I cannot emphasize this enough- start your essays early. Write them, rewrite them, and proofread them. IF you have a good essay, nothing else really matters :X
I made the mistake of starting my essays like the month they were due- all 10 of them.
D:</p>
<p>Anyway, good luck :D</p>
<p>Thanks for the advice, I too seem to find myself procrastinating more than I would like. I'm going to try and get a lot of my ssat prep done during the summer so that it won't interfere with school.</p>