Boarding School Cultures

Prep School Admissions
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Would add about Putney:
Although independence is emphasized, so is community and social conscience. Putney is very small, everybody eventually knows everybody. Entire school body meets for “Sing” once or twice a week (not seen as drudgery by students, they engage most enthusiastically). Most “dorms” are very small, many of them more like houses. Almost all faculty live on campus and/or as house parents or substitute house parents. All classes very small. No way to hide here, academically, socially, or otherwise.

Attracts and is good for students who are outside the box in any way. Very accepting of differences. And yet there are plenty of seemingly “normal” kids!

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Lake Forest: We know 2 kids from summer camp days who go to Lake Forest. Kids still chat. The students are great kids, kind, down to earth, fun, smart but not gloating about their EC’s or grades. Seems like a good group of kids!

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PM me if you need some help on DA

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This thread is helpful. Discerning culture is not easy when coming from a community that does not send many (any) kids to boarding school and I’m assuming the revisit days will include a pretty strong sell, so answers to direct questions may not always be totally reflective of reality. So, what is the best way to get an idea of a schools true “culture?” Looking for an environment that emphasizes kindness, compassion, collaboration, support and acceptance. Specifically, Id love to hear from anyone on this topic about Loomis. Thanks!

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“Tone is in your fingers.” And “school culture” is (some)what you make of it. Each kid brings part of the culture of a school with them and can either conform or resist. If you think a school’s “culture”, whatever that is, is not to your liking, yet you applied and were accepted, ask yourself why. Maybe you won’t come up with anything and move on to some place some thing more fitting or familiar or whatever, but if you feel like you have an answer as to why such a place with such a seemingly ill-fitting “culture” chose you, then the next question is am I supposed to follow or lead?

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Grier: I feel like it has all that you described as different cultures of different schools, and also other schools that people added in this thread. At a diverse place like a boarding school, culture could be what you make of, by both being a person with that quality, and interacting with people with similar qualities. It took some time for my geeky and introvert daughter to find where she belongs, but she did found what she was looking for - being surrounded by people like her and enjoying the interaction.

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Can anybody tell me about Choate, NMH, MX, or Milton? I’m visiting them for the first time soon… so excited! :smiley:

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@waterbug2 On revisit days DH and I watched how existing members of the community interacted with each other: admin with admin, admin with faculty and staff, faculty and staff with each other, adults with students, students with students. Also telling: how are the faculty and staff cared for institutionally? We think that matters a lot. If you can, try to steal moments with adults in the school community and engage with them one on one. Pay attention to your takeaways from those interactions. Attend faculty panels and parent panels and student panels and listen and watch how questions are answered. All those responses can’t all be rehearsed. And before you revisit, read the rules and procedures. Do they make sense? When you revisit ask how the procedures work in reality. How does the school respond when students stumble? I think that if you go to the revisit(s) prepared to listen, watch and dig, it can be an authentic experience of a school’s culture.

Nico, although my kid decided to attend another school, we all really loved NMH. As my kid says, the place has heart. We attended one of their class visit days and enjoyed the students, faculty and parents that we met–everyone was very warm and friendly. Our sense is that there is very good student support from the adults in the community. We were also impressed by their head of school; he seems bright and full of energy. One experience this school year reminded us about the culture there: during an athletic contest where several schools were in attendance I found myself looking around to watch how teammates and coaches from the various schools were behaving. I have to say that those from NMH were an especially happy bunch, with lots of enthusiasm and cheering for one another.

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@AppleNotFar I can’t believe how kind everyone from NMH has been to me. I’ve received amazingly kind emails from AOs, and I actually attended an event hosted by a current family in their home last night. Everyone is so kind! I really really really have a difficult descision to make… Choate and Milton and Middlesex have been a bit colder, but I guess that they are far more busy (correction: Middlesex did call me). Putney sent me a mug that they made in their ceramics studio, and I literally felt so happy and it was the kindest thing ever!

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@“Nico.campbell” Out of curiosity, do you need or are you getting FA from any of these schools?

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@panpacific we were full pay (when I look at the tuitions even I get lightheaded: can’t imagine my parents)

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Oh it just means your parents haven’t been really transparent with you about their finances! :slight_smile:

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Anyone know something about Deerfield or Groton? :)) thanks.

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Omg!! I just realized I said this awhile ago… I have also made a thread, but this one is a little more popular and I put it into the college discussions by accident… I was hoping someone who is at the school could tell me! Also anyone with children there, can you please PM me?

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Booksanfries, congratulations on the Deerfield and other acceptances! In response to your question, our DS says the culture at Deerfield is very friendly and supportive. It is certainly not cut throat. Even so, students at Deerfield often work very hard as the courses (particularly honors and AP courses) can be very challenging and demanding. Furthermore, students at DA are most often quite ambitious. Still, Deerfield manages to maintain a collaborative culture and approach. My DS often helps students in his hall way in the subjects he is strong in and gets guidance from others in the courses he feels less comfortable with. While the dress code is a bit more formal than elsewhere, DS does not seem to mind. Instead, he now believes that dressing well validates his efforts and shows respect for the academic excellence he is participating in. Our DS also seems to relish the strong traditions (e.g. sit-down dinners) and collegiality that define DA. In addition, DS consistently manages to have fun over the weekend. Finally, he is quite passionate with his team sports, which are an integral part of the Deerfield weekend and overall experience.

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I’m a Putney parent.

Is it a hippy school? It is accepting of counter culture but it isn’t required. The progressive experiential pedagogy steers the classrooms and campus life. It is intimate and rustic, with emphasis on measured risk and ‘honest work’… meaning engaging in labor regularly. The kids are responsible for their school, that includes failure at times. I think it’s absolutely not for everyone, but it shapes a certain kind of citizen for our world. I wish the school was more diverse economically and racially, they do what the can with a small endowment and it’s ‘unique’ appeal of being a working rural farm. You WILL have to get up at 5 AM and clean up after cows, or wash dishes or clean your dorm. You’ll be encouraged to be a leader in some shape or form, maybe managing other students at these tasks… or perhaps be on the board of trustees. What sold me as a parent? The holistic lens where I knew my kid was going to be shaped by many experiences, including failure. Competition is mostly internal self reflection. That’s really tough sometimes… and occasionally as a parent it makes me wince. Teenagers ‘adulting’… is like watching them ice skating for the first time. You have to be okay with that, the trust factor is a big one. Is the tradition of ‘Sing’ amazing and a little magical? Yeah… it’s the antidote to all that individualism.

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Thank you so much for this answer, it explains a lot about the culture at Deerfield. @happarent6

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Is there anyone on here who doesn’t like their or their kids’s boarding school? The only cross words I have seen in this thread is for a rival school. Anyone reading this thread looking for people’s thought, take that into consideration. I keep seeing the same words used to describe every school’s culture, and yet they are all very different, demonstrating that there is no substitute for visiting the school yourself.

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@Korab1 perhaps a more interesting and informative thread would be one where folks list the top 3 cons/negatives for their respective school. :slight_smile:

Here’s something that’s been on my mind for a few days now: many, if not most kids who applied to “top” (30-40) boarding schools are rather adaptable kids who could probably be happy and successful in a number of different school environments. While it’s wonderful to have the option to investigate several and then choose the one that feels best (which you should definitely do if you can), in reality I don’t think it matters all that much at the end of the day. I’m sensitive to the families and kiddos who can’t revisit (or even visit in the first place), and my sense is that once they choose using whatever exposure they’ve had to these schools and then attend, it will all be fantastic for them as well (thinking of you @Atria ). On the other hand, there are some kids who may be more atypical for whom the nuances really do matter. In those cases families need to be much more careful in choosing.

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I apologize for the long post. This is in response to @Korab1 - I have mixed feelings about my daughter’s school in several areas. However, none of these things would be obvious during revisits. I also don’t think that my daughter’s school is unique - so I won’t name the school other than to say it is one of the HADES GLADCHEMM group. I write this only as a caution to other parents - BS is no utopia.

I was not happy with the health center’s approach to managing illness and they were unable to deal with my daughter’s mental health issues. After her first fall, I found that the best way to manage any illness that lasted more than a few days was to bring her home. The sick policy was that you could only miss classes if you were actually at the health center. Yet, it was noisy and the only food they had was ramen and similar level snacks. In addition, whenever she met with a counselor, their response was essentially “Maybe this school isn’t the right place for you and you should leave”

I was also displeased with her advisors for the first two years. Her first year advisor was new to the school and knew very little about the classes, pre-reqs, etc. Her second year advisor encouraged her to drop her lab science (she was struggling) and then did not have her sign up for a lab science her third year. This made applying to college a bit challenging. Luckily her advisor for years three and four was stellar.

The math and science departments were hit or miss. My daughter had several very good instructors and an equal number that were duds.

I also don’t think the school sufficiently taught the values of honor and academic honesty. It has a lot of nice sounding words on their website and in their print materials but, in our experience, those values were not evident on a day-to-day basis. There was a surprising amount of cheating, some of it very blatant (kids instructed to work on a take home test by themselves were actually working on it as a group in the dining hall, kids discussing test answers while on intermission during a final, kids with answers programmed into their devices, etc.) My daughter reported her observations to several instructors but the teachers did nothing.

There was also a significant theft problem her first year. Things were stolen from dances and from dorm rooms. Instead of discussing this with the student body, notes were sent out suggesting that students safeguard their belongings more carefully.

And, despite many of the comments on CC, students were actually pretty competitive. In addition to the cheating, some students took classes over the summer and then repeated them at BS, which impacted the curve and their GPA. The students also revealed their competitive natures when it was time to apply to college. This wasn’t necessarily a bad thing - they were, in fact, competing for a limited number of spots at highly selective colleges. No one bragged about their results but there were definitely sore losers.

However, all of the above notwithstanding, my daughter’s experience was overwhelmingly positive. She discovered new interests, developed friendships that will likely last her lifetime and was admitted to her top choice ivy league college, which she was well prepared for and loves.