Is the elite BS experience all that it is cracked up to be?

@cinnamon1212 Day students get their own room! Wow!
At Peddie, there is a general lounge area, but day students are allowed in any of the dorm lounges as well. There are arrangements available if a day student needs a convenience stay (plus sleepovers are allowed.)

[quote="vegas1
This varies wildly from the PS styles we regularly encounter. Our older daughter finished high school at our local public school in a relatively affluent small town in MA and our younger daughter has many friends who attended this same high school. The trend seems to be to wear full face makeup, dress sexy and many girls have embraced the Kardashian look. (Heavy makeup , crazy eyelashes etc
). This isn’t meant to be judgmental, as I actually find the BS style to be more unusual. (my daughter literally wouldn’t wear mascara to Prom -super weird for this Vegas girl!) Just wondering if this is a quirk of our kids BS vs PS or a wider trend?

[/quote]

That may be more your area than BS thing because my daughter went to NYC private and wearing make up to school was quite rare, and if anything girls wore little mascara and maybe tinted moisturizer to hide any skin issues. Never a full face make up. Many (my daughter included) played sports and had practice before or after school so it would not have been very practical anyway. At night and to parties, for sure makeup was worn. But to school, the ‘roll out of bed’ look was quite popular, with messy bun, leggings as pants and too short shorts leading the way in dress fashions. I find that at the BS there is definitely a contingent of girls who are more put together, including some make up (not excessive by any means) but the roll out of bed look is also alive and well, as are leggings as pants (and very short shorts when it was still warm, perhaps to compensate for the oversized shorts the boys were wearing).

OP, they keep kids off the phone by giving them lots of homework. Even today with a snow day, there was homework assigned. Keeps them from keeping up with the Kardashians and other nonsense.

When we looked at various BS, we did see variances in cell phone usage. I love that phones are not allowed in class and kids will remind others about phone use. I have never seen a kid Face timing in public or talking loudly via cell phone on campus. Doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen, I have just never seen it.

In terms of makeup and dress, I find that both mothers and daughters seem to be less decked out in terms of vavavoom wear and excessive makeup at all BS’s. That is not the case for my younger child’s school which is private. I think it’s more a factor of where the school is located than anything else. Public schools tend to have more kids so the local public has lots of girls who are wearing tons of makeup and clothes that you wouldn’t wear past the age of 20. But, they are young and experimenting. I have not seen excessive piercings/tatoos at any school. Again, I think it’s more a function of where you live. There is a town near us, which is well known for the women having lots of plastic surgery. Those who like that will likely chose a place like that to live while others might be comfortable in a more laid back place. Same goes for BS.

Some BS have fully integrated day and boarders. Some have just a handful of boarders or boarders who don’t integrate as mentioned above. You have to check what the ratio is, and also if there are any other variances that could impact your kid ( for example are all the varsity athletes in a specific sport day students?) I honestly think people make more of the day/boarding than it is, but my kids school seems to have kids integrating across all grades and day/boarding so I really don’t know the downsides of it not working well.

I only ever see phones out at the student center or the main lounge at the dorm but I am not sure if it is function of when the kids have time to use them or if there are rules. I believe you can use the phone during your free periods if you are hanging out at the cafe or one of the sitting areas in the academic buildings too. But honestly they all have laptop/iPad access all day so it’s not like they can’t waste time on YouTube during the day in between classes if so inclined, they don’t need phone for that. The snap chatting etc. usually happens after sports practice or after study hall right before bed at least based on what I see from my kid’s social media activity.