Trying to decide between several schools as an incoming 9th grader, and apart from academics and fit, travel distance to the school seems to be taking on “veto” power for schools beyond a certain distance.
For example, Schools with 2 to 3 hours drive time (each way) now looking more favorable than those in the 4 to 5 hour range.
Outside of official breaks or family weekends, do some parents occasionally visit on random weekend(s) or do some students spend random weekend(s) at home? Do some schools recommend against this so students ensure they are embedded into campus community? Perhaps being only a 9th grader is making us think about this.
Every family is different of course, but wondering if any guidance from how others did (or did not) take travel distance into account in their decision making. Thanks
If the schools are equal in all other areas, I would definitely choose one in the 2-3 hour range. We are a flight away from both of our kiddos, and there have been plenty of times I wish we could easily stop by for an afternoon to watch a game or performance. And while my kids are perfectly happy NOT having us come by often, they are usually at least excited for a quick trip with us to Target or the grocery store.
ETA: Not to mention, being closer to school makes packing up at the end of the year much easier because you can start to bring things home toward the end of the school year, instead of waiting until the last day.
Also don’t underestimate how often official breaks and parents weekends are - I feel we are driving the 2 1/2 hours back and forth to my child’s school once a month - am very glad we didn’t choose one of the schools further away.
Distance was a big deciding factor for my son. However, he was making a decision during COVID and had only “seen” schools online so that may have been a factor in his comfort being further away. This has turned out to be the right decision for him.
While he doesn’t come home every weekend, he likes that he can when he wants and it has allowed him to stay close with his friends from home. Maintaining those friendships has helped him keep a good perspective on things and not get swept up in the micro/all encompassing aspects and “drama” of the social aspects of boarding school. He LOVES his school and is not trying to “get away” but he also likes being able to “take a break” when he wants.
He has a friend that chose to go further away and tried to transfer to a closer school as they feel they need more frequent trips home - just to get a break and a little more “support” and they like the situation my son has been in.
Yes, parents who live nearby attend musical events or plays or games. This obviously varies by school but many parents try to stay up to date by visiting often.
Agree with @cityran – if all else is equal, then I would choose closer. But I would NOT choose closer in sacrifice of something else. My kids are all a day trip (flying – we live in a non-central airport zone ourselves so changing planes is needed). I DO wish we could be there more often. We DID fly out for special kid moments like my daughter’s first musical, and my other daughter’s first diving meet. So we just added that into the cost/time equation.
One other thing: I would definitely consider how many OTHER students will be closer to get a feel for the weekend culture. I feel like my kids’ school has very vibrant weekend culture.
For us being close enough to come to campus easily was important enough that our kid only applied to schools 2-3 hours away. But we live in the NE so there were a lot of options in that category. IME lots of parents come to campus for Saturday games, both from home and away teams, parents attend all the musical performances, plays, dancing recitals and just about any performance events are open to parents. We even see parents from far away renting a place locally and staying around for weeks at the time, much easier now with hybrid/remote work being the norm.
And it is nice for the kids to be able to come home for family events, social events with home friends, when sick instead of being stuck in the health center, or just to get a break. So if you have comparable options and one is a lot closer than the other it would be a no brainer for me.
I agree with all those saying, all things being equal, choose closer.
For those, like us, who required flights, consider proximity to airports and direct flights. Like @Calliemomofgirls, our trips always required stops as no airline flew flew direct to the airport closest to Choate. We never considered this, and travel logistics were tricky sometimes. Over the four years, we made it to campus only for drop-off, Parents Weekend, and College Info weekend. Our son packed himself up and flew home alone at yearend. We missed a lot but, as I always say, he missed nothing.
@FrabjousDays, you are fortunate that all of your choices are drivable, but I agree with this:
First, think about what you - the parent want. Do you want to visit for a game? Drive in, watch game, return home same day? While I have driven to the occasionally event 4 hours away and driven home the same night, it’s exhausting. If you have the funds and time, you can stay in a hotel nearby and take your kid out to dinner (and a Target run the next day.) This is more doable, and distance may or may not matter. Put simply – how often do you want to visit and what kind of visit? If you want to watch every game, you really need the 2 hour option!
What are the school policies for sickness?. At certain closer distances, you may be expected (and you may want) to pick up your kid and nurse them at home. Further away, the infirmary may become more accomodating.
What works for your kid? Do they want to come home a lot? How does that affect their bond to the community? What’s the norm at the school? At many schools, many boarders leave on weekends. (This is why it’s important to not assume that because a school has a high percentage of boarders, it has a more robust weekend life.) Is there a public transport option from school to home? It’s a very difficult thing for you to drive tound trip twice in a weekend for your kid to come home than for them to hop on a train/bus - do a little homework-- then sleep in their own bed. Some kids maintain friendships at home, others less so. Ime, that is less about distances and seeing each other than the kids themselves.
There are lots of long distance parents on this board as well as ones who are closer. It’s hard to predict how everyone will feel about this, but most people end up okay with their choice.
“We missed a lot but, as I always say, he missed nothing.” @ChoatieMom sums this up well…
I’m so glad you brought up this topic because it’s top of mind in our household too. I want to add to my comments above that we are actually considering spending 9 months on the east coast so we can enjoy one cycle of being driving distance to our kids (both in BS and the one in college). Our BS has so many cool traditions and events that we thought it would be lovely to experience one cycle of them in person. We work from home so it is a feasible thing for us to do, so while I am “fine” with them being across the country, at the same time…I’m also considering moving east for one school year. So obviously I would say there IS a benefit to being driving distance! (although note – we would not be necessarily “local” so we would still need to get hotel, etc. – just driving distance not flying).
But then again, if there is a choice like OP has, why would you miss a lot if you don’t have to? I think it is perfectly fine to consider entire family, relationships with parents and siblings, I even see grandparents around campus quite regularly for all sorts of things. There is nothing wrong with wanting to be closer if the choice is available.
As a general comment, it does seem like more and more boarding schools are ditching Saturday classes, which is opening up the weekends, for better or worse. Not just for family, lots of kids seem to be using them to be advancing their extracurriculars off campus all over the place.
I’m not saying that distance shouldn’t be considered. That was my first line.
But you should think about why you are considering distance as well as how you’ll manage it. Maybe if you show up for a game, stay over locally, have dinner, go shopping, hang out the next day,etc, it’ll be more meaningful for all of you than drive in for a game, dropped off brownies, and drive back home. But maybe you want to see every game. Or you may not have enough time off in any case, so the weekend visit will always be better.
I am not advocating one way or the other because neither is better. But one may fit one family better than another.
Btw, having looked at data on this, most families do choose schools within 2 hours of home.
I haven’t taken the time to read all the responses, but my opinion is that if my kid is going to be away from home, I want them to be at the school that’s the best fit for them, even if that means they are farther away. Both of my older two kids turned down schools that were a 5-6 hour drive from home to attend a school that was a 14-hour drive (they fly to and from, but we have made the drive several times). In our case, I wasn’t going to be close enough to see them all the time either way, so we decided not to factor in distance, especially since they had a strong preference for the farther away school and we agreed that school was a better fit. It was very important to me though, that they be at a school with a high percentage of boarders and a strong weekend campus culture.
We’ve had instances where they’ve been sick and stuck in the health center, which was difficult as parents. But when one of them was very sick with COVID, yet not sick enough to warrant hospitalization, it wasn’t lost on me that his school was providing better care for him than I could have at home—he had medical professionals watching over him, providing him with the best meds, and keeping him hydrated with an IV. And we’ve always told them that, if needed, we will hop in the car at a moment’s notice and be there in 14 hours. (Maybe worth noting that we live 2 hours from the closest major airport which is a challenge)
Our first kid was in a school that was a 4.5-5hr drive and the second was a 2-2.5hr drive.
Generally speaking for the 4.5hr school, we would generally spend the night unless it was something quick, like end of year pick up. We did go to sporting events, especially when they would travel towards our direction to play schools (there weren’t many in the farther direction thank goodness). We went every year for Family Weekend and that ended up being about it. Visits also decreased as kid got older.
Younger kid seems to be getting about the same number of visits actually as older one did. I have popped in for a couple more home games than the farther away kid since day visits are easier, but nothing unusual. Starting during Covid restricted how much we could visit initially also.
My child (Sunnykid) attends a boarding school with Saturday classes and it does seem that this year there are many, many Saturdays when they don’t have class. It doesn’t seem to affect Sunnykid much as their friends are also from far away, but I know from speaking to another parent that most of his child’s friends are from a 2-3 hour radius and they go home any weekend where there is not Saturday classes. Also seems like a lot of them go home on Saturdays after class as well and then return on Sunday night. This school is like 95% boarding students.
We are a 12 hour + drive away from the boarding school and there are definitely challenges, most of which other people have already mentioned. If you are a parent with a high need to be involved and see everything in person, go for the shorter distance. The first year was hard for me to not be involved/going to all of the sporting events etc. but I quickly got used to livestreaming events and such. It’s not good or bad, just a different parenting experience from our experience with our older children who did not attend boarding school.
If you are in driving distance from both I am not sure it will matter if it’s 4 hours vs. 2 hours away. The travel hassles we have had are with air travel (cancelled flights, unaccompanied minors, needing to get a car service, etc.). It can be stressful. A lot of stress and a lot of extra money. Ultimately it’s worth it but… it’s just a lot.
My daughter is switching schools this year. Distance was a huge factor in that decision. She will be 3.5 hours away instead of 6. The distance was harder on both of us than we ever imagined (she has gone to summer camp for 6-8 weeks every summer so being away was nothing new). But she plays ice hockey and I really missed being at her games and she missed having me there. Plus when there is a problem that only a hug from mom can fix, 6 hours made that nearly impossible. I had gone to boarding school myself so I thought knowing she would be having a great experience would make me ok with her being so far - it didn’t!!
Big consideration for a child and family for four years. Our children are a long car ride ride or flight. Our children eliminated some definite flight only options. We typically make 1-2 games or events per child per season but this includes parents’ weekends. In this vein, what happens on weekends is one thing I continue to say look at. If your child decides they love a school where a fair number of boarders leave on weekends then they’ll probably want that same option even if they have friends staying on campus.
Deerfield never has classes on Saturdays, but, many sports have games/meets in the afternoon. Perhaps they are accommodating for the opponent teams who may have morning classes. So sports won’t be done until late afternoon, and then students need to be back on campus by 6pm on Sunday. Not a huge window of time.
If a student does yoga, volunteering, conditioning, or theater-type activites as their cocurricular activity, then maybe those are held in the mornings or not at all on a weekend.
Deerfield is certainly remote, and therefore there are few day students (most of the day students are faculty kids) but it seems that the vast majority of the student do not leave campus on a weekend. Deerfield’s attempt to keep the kids engaged with events on a weekend has far exceeded our expectation. Last year, I felt like the Student Life office went into overdrive in organizing events/speakers/game nights/festivals/food trucks for the students because of how miserable the covid years were and they were trying to have the upperclassmen have somewhat of a more fun/celebration year on campus. This year, however, it hasn’t lessened, so maybe that’s just how Deerfield rolls, and is something which contributes to the closeness of the student body.
I watch many games on live streaming. For some sports it works reasonably well, say volleyball. For many others, not really. For example, swimming. They all look alike with swimsuit and goggles on. I have to ask about heat and lane assignments to see where DD is. Theater is okay, but symphony is not, especially if kids sit in the back row. Not to mention that some sports have no live streaming at all.
For most kids, they don’t need to see parents on campus that much. I think it’s mostly the parents who want to get involved worry about the inconvenience. And sometimes it’s just money. Think storage for summer.
Pick the one that is best for the kid, and pick the closer one if two options are about the same. If money is an issue, pick the cheaper one. You can save at least a few K per year in tuition so no need to worry about a late flight or transportation to airport or storage.