<p>I want boardings schools that have a strong history and science departments. Basically a humanities program. I want it to have a big campus and have a welcoming environment. Something with a lot of school spirit/pride. Do you guys know anything like this or close?</p>
<p>You’ve described almost every BS discussed on this board. You can match your definition of “big” by looking at boardingschoolreview.com which lists size of student body and campus acreage.</p>
<p>All schools have school spirit and pride and welcoming environments or no one would attend them. All schools discussed here have strong academic programs. You should narrow your search based on criteria available on boardingschoolreview.com and then scour each of those schools’ websites for program information. Once you have a list of schools that speak to you, you can ask more specific questions about those schools here and plan some visits if you can.</p>
<p>@bria66775: +1 on what ChoatieMom says above.</p>
<p>Here’s some more advice to you (and every other newbie) who is considering applying to boarding school this application cycle:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>DO YOUR HOMEWORK BEFORE STARTING A “WHAT SCHOOLS FOR ME?” THREAD HERE
That means starting with boardingschoolreview.com and <a href=“http://www.boardingschools.com”>www.boardingschools.com</a> (a TABS site). And also this forum. In my time on the forum (this will be my 5th year active, as we started when my older girl was just starting to look at schools…she is now a Senior), I’ve found that the forum REWARDS people who have done some poking around, reading old threads, etc.</p></li>
<li><p>TAKE THE SSAT (AT LEAST A PRACTICE TEST) BEFORE DECIDING WHAT SCHOOLS YOU’LL APPLY TO
People will most likely take issue with analogy I’m about to use, but I’m going to use it anyway. Let’s say you are applying to college not BS. And that you’ve taken the SAT and gotten 600s in the various sections. Is anyone going to suggest applying to Harvard and feeling good about your chances? Probably not. But plenty of kids come on to the forum asking for their chances to Exeter before they’ve even taken the SSAT. And some of those kids end up with not-so-strong scores. Or have other weaknesses in their application profile, especially relative to the already self-selected applicant pool.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>That said, don’t become one of these kids who stresses about getting a 99%-ile. If you’re in the 85%-ile range, your scores will probably not be the factor that keeps you from being admitted to school X, Y, Z (even the most selective schools).</p>
<p>First, you need to narrow down your criteria. Your criteria is EXTREMELY broad. Pick five or six things that are really important, and then things you want but don’t need. Check websites like boardingschoolreview.com and boardingschools.com and search schools after that.</p>
<p>There’s SO many boarding schools that have what youre looking for. literally almost all of them. But, I do want to recommend my new school! Saint James in Hagerstown, Maryland. My science and history classes are both extremely small, and they just began offering a psychology class for upperclassmen. It has a HUGE campus, with really old buildings (it’s been here since 1862 I believe). It is Episcopalian, but I do really love the church aspect of it. Please, just look at it. It’s a hidden gem, and I haven’t been here for that long yet. It’s amazing here, give it a chance!</p>