<p>My daughter and I just came back from Kent and it was great. The campus is incredible and everyone was very nice and welcoming.</p>
<p>The revisit day was organized very well for the students and the parents. This is one of the schools that is very underrated on CC but italianboarder was such a good resource for us.</p>
<p>yea i think the revisit day was great</p>
<p>My son is going to the revisit day on Thursday, so it’s great to hear that you both liked it!</p>
<p>We also had a great revisit at Kent on Monday. Agree Kent is underrated on CC…Bright, happy and well-adjusted students…</p>
<p>Yup, I wish that Kent was better rated, since it seems like an awesome school</p>
<p>The “rating” that you put on it is all that matters. Kent is a great school and even though my son has chosen another, he knows that he could have gotten a great education there. I think it is an especially good school for kids with particular strengths. They seem to encourage their students to go as far as they can in the subjects they are passionate about and support them in their endeavors. I have never heard of a student not being challenged there.</p>
<p>And it’s very very beautiful. :)</p>
<p>Grrrr, Kent refuses to answer my phone calls!</p>
<p> Well I’m glad your revisit went nice. What does the campus look/feel like? </p>
<p>The campus was really nice. It was warm on Monday, so it was good weather to be walking outside.</p>
<p>Also, for those interested, Kent School is part of the “Select 16” boarding schools which is a term coined decades ago by a legendary sociology professor at the University of Pennsylvania named E. Digby Baltzell who created this famous list of the most socially prestigious boarding schools in the country. </p>
<p>So, for those hung up on prestige, Peter Cookson and Caroline Hodges Persell identified Professor Baltzell’s “Select 16” in their book, “Preparing for Power: America’s Elite Boarding Schools.” The Select 16 are in alphabetical order:</p>
<p>Choate (CT)
Deerfield (MA)
Episcopal High School (VA)
Groton (MA)
Hill School ¶
Hotchkiss (CT)
Kent (CT)
Lawrenceville (NJ)
Middlesex (MA)
Phillips Andover Academy (MA)
Phillips Exeter Academy (NH)
St. George’s School (RI)
St. Mark’s School (MA)
St. Paul’s School (NH)
Taft School (CT)
Woodberry Forest School (VA)</p>
<p>thats interesting. i have never heard of that before</p>
<p>Oh no, now there’s a new thing like HADES X[</p>
<p>that book was written in like the 80s soo it doesnt really apply anymore</p>
<p>I know, but there are noobs afoot and someone will mention that :P</p>
<p>and this was a social ranking not a academic ranking</p>
<p>Hi All, just to be clear from my “Select 16” post - yes, it is a “socially prestigious” list which doesn’t perfectly correspond with academic prestige. However, nearly all of the “Select 16” (Woodbery Forest is the exception) probably rank in the top 30 or so in the academic rankings of boarding schools and many of the “Select 16” are clearly in the top 10 of academic elite (St. Paul’s, Exeter, Andover, etc.). What “socially prestigious” also means is those schools are more likely to have students who are sons/daughters of European royalty or with names like “Henry Witherspoon IV” and who are more likely to have a large percentage of “legacies” as students (think St. Paul’s as a good example)…which may or may not be appealing to have as a classmate, that is personal preference…finally, bear in mind the term “Select 16” was developed by an Ivy League sociology professor after extensive sociologic research, and “HADES” was developed by an 8th grader on CC a year or two ago (no offense to 8th graders, I like “HADES” it is kind of catchy)…“Select 16” is just another way of classifying the “feel” or “heritage” of a school…only one of many many lists to help students figure out the differences between schools and which is the best fit for each student. Hope that is helpful.</p>
<p>yeah, i know. but just objecting/reacting to all the gropings going on on this site. :P</p>
<p>I can’t speak for my son, who had his last revisit today at Kent, but I thought it was a lovely campus and an impressive institution. The kids seemed articulate, friendly, and involved. We didn’t have the opportunity to meet as many professors as I would have liked, but that had more to do with how we mapped out our interests during a day that was very self-structured for parents. The campus and surrounding town are ridiculously picturesque. The closest in-town store (about 3 min away by foot) is a Belgian patisserie and chocolatier (not a pizza parlor, or a CVS, but a pastry shop that serves homemade pastries and fois gras by the former personal chef of the Belgian ambassador to the US–that is crazy)! The campus is small but well-maintained. The athletic program is particularly impressive, but not for the reasons I had assumed. There truly seems to be a focus on athleticism as a primal part of the well-rounded student–but that athleticism doesn’t have to be defined by a division 1, 2, or 3 sports team. Offerings include club mountain biking, sailing, yoga, and on and on. The student panel featured jocks who sang in the school choir; an Afgan girl who was exploring the first real educational opportunities she had been afforded; a “glee” club girl who had thrived at the arts department; and on and on. Perhaps more than at the other revisit days we’ve been to, this seems to be a privileged campus (a lot of moms who are “skinny-minis”–fit, beautifully dressed, tan, guilt/insecurity-inducing). A famous movie-star was there with his son, and no one seemed fazed (with the exception of my son, who was the only man, woman or child to go up and introduce himself–not so good). I guess my overall impressions of the school are of “luck” and “blessedness” and “good-fortune”. I was very keenly aware of how privileged any child is to be educated and nurtured in such a bucolic, pristine and academically-rigorous environment.</p>
<p>^ a famous movie star?! hahah, i know curiosity killed the cat, and at this rate it’s going to kill me, too…</p>
<p>kent seems pretty impressive, does anyone know how competitive intl FA is (by intl, i mean Canada) is at kent, and if they have it at all? thanks !</p>
<p>Just for fun, he starred as Jedi Knight Qui-Gon Jinn. I think the poor man needs a proper meal, a tan and a shave.</p>
<p>:O! ^^ fascinating… edit: i further googled (i’m a whiz kid, go me!) him, and his boys are cutie patooties! i’m their age though, so i’m not a pedophile, thanks :)</p>
<p>would you call kent’s students pretentious, at all? from what i’ve heard (and from your post… i mean, foie gras??), kent’s students seem really well-off, with a lot of affluent new yorkers mixed in… i mean, if a full (or close) FA student went to kent, how would they be treated? is there a visible difference between FPs and kids on FA?</p>
<p>hmm, thanks :)</p>