<p>My son attends a military school, not the best, but one I consider to be fairly typical. The "cream of the crop" is Culver; they are selective and get some really outstanding students. The rest vary. We chose a co-ed military school, the co-ed ones seem to be more like regular boarding schools with a military flair. Randolph Macon Academy is a really nice co-ed school and is considered by the staff at my son's school to be one of the best. It is not an ivy mill-it is rare for kids to go to ivies out of military schools. The graduates of my son's school range from places like Duke, Davidson, Wake, UNC, UVa to the less competitive state universities and private colleges. My son tells me he has met some of the brightest and some of the the slowest students ever at his school.</p>
<p>One thing to watch out for is schools with big post graduate programs. The post graduate programs are for kids who are athletes that want to play Div I sports and are there to raise their SAT scores, complete missing HS courses-basically trying to become eligible. I preferred for my son to be with HS students.</p>
<p>The kids best helped by military schools are kids like my son-smart, disorganized, never been in trouble. Kids with big problems (drugs, major rebelliousness issues) don't last and are sent home. Military schools do not help emotionally disturbed kids and can't assist with learning disabilities. Be careful if your child has any acting out issues; those sent home do not get a refund and it can become a 25-30K mistake for many. My son's school has already sent seven kids home (for alcohol, pot, and gross defiance). I don't blame the school. Parents are so desperate that they will hide their child's problem on the application and most public school counselors won't tell the military school about a problem on the application.</p>
<p>The positives-my son loves his teachers. He gets to play varsity sports and be somebody. The enforced study hall at night has been helpful and his grades are better. The school is not as academic as his very competitive, top ranked public high school was so the quality is not as high (but he wasn't making much use of it anyway with his 3.1 GPA ). Send your kid to a military school if you are not HYPS bound, and, more importantly, if you want your child to become more responsible and caring toward others. Since going, my son has become more polite, responsible, and focused on what he wants to do in life. Military schools focus on the group. If one kid messes up, the entire company is affected by it (neatest company with the highest GPA gets to eat first). My son has helped the slower kids with math, proof-read papers for ESL students and loaned out missing uniform parts to help his company avoid loosing status. These are behaviors I never saw in him before going to military school. He has sung in a retirement home, loaded up Toys for Tots in the rain (community service) and sat one-on-one with the president of the school and was given a cola as they discussed a problem he was having (he failed to report a student setting off a smoke bomb-caught on video camera; his punishment? Coming back a day early from break to rake the president's lawn and then being treated to ice cream and a movie later).</p>
<p>The negatives-lots of rules, structure, very short hair and having to cope with military school stereotypes ("why did you send him to military school. He's such a nice kid..."). The school also has the kids get up really early which goes against typical adolescent biology so sleep deprivation is a problem.</p>
<p>Check out the parent letter on the Randolph Macon site. I think this mother's long letter sums up beautifully what your typical military school success story can be.</p>
<p>I'll repeat something I often hear from young men who were "lost boys", "Military school is the best thing that ever happened to me".</p>