Nobles Academic Standing

Prep School Admissions Prep School Parents
1

<p>Does anyone have a son or daughter at Noble and Greenough in Dedham? Are they considered more "academic" or "sports oriented"? In looking through their catalog, I find it odd that English and History have no "honors" sections. I am wondering now if they are really academically competitive with the rest of the day schools around Boston. It would seem they should have more sectioning with honors level courses. JMHO.</p>

2

<p>I think the classes are not labeled “AP” but are advanced enough for the student to take the AP tests. Below is also in Milton’s catalog:</p>

<p>AP/Honors/Advanced/Independent Courses
Milton labels accelerated work in four ways: Advanced
Placement (AP), Honors (H), Advanced (Adv.) and
Independent Course (Ind.).
Milton Academy is not an AP-driven school. The Academy
does not offer AP courses in English, US History, or science.
However, the intensity of our program does qualify students
to take a number of AP exams.</p>

3

<p>I don’t have a child at Nobles, but here is a link to the school’s profile: <a href=“http://www.nobles.edu/files/College%20Profile%202010.pdf[/url]”>http://www.nobles.edu/files/College%20Profile%202010.pdf&lt;/a&gt;. The profile includes AP and SAT subject tests for the classes of 2010 and 2011, through June 2010. Look closely at the results for the AP History and English tests. I don’t think they need to section their classes, as their results are stellar.</p>

<p>A lack of honors courses, in and of itself, does not mean that a school is not “academically competitive.” It could mean that the school is exceedingly academically competitive, as the school accepts a narrower band of ability, and thus does not need to section the classes into more and less demanding streams. (I would place Nobles into the “academically competitive” category.)</p>

<p>Offering honors and non-honors courses is a sign that the student body represents a wider range of ability. There’s nothing wrong with that! It is a different experience, and parents should enquire about the school’s placement policies.</p>

4

<p>Great school. About as snobby as you’ll ever find, though!</p>

5

<p>The athletics are pretty intense there. Which is not to say that the academics aren’t good, also.</p>

6

<p>I would say Nobles is more of a decent academic school with athletics that are very good. They take their fields pretty seriously . . . . when I went there for a visit, I learned that their varsity baseball field was ranked in the Top 100 to play baseball a game in by some accredited magazine. Yeah.</p>

<p>I would say that they are about middle of the pack when it comes to the ISL. These are the SAT averages for all three categories (numbers excluded). Schools that are grouped place within a region, for example, a score of 2070-2100.</p>

<p>Tier 1

  1. Roxbury Latin
  2. Groton
  3. Milton
  4. St. Paul’s, Middlesex
  5. Belmont Hill, BB&N
  6. Nobles</p>

<p>Tier 2
9. St. Mark’s
10. Rivers
11. St. George’s
12. St. Sebastian’s
13. Brooks, Thayer
15. Governor’s
16. Lawrence</p>

<p>I think it provides a good sense (switch around a few schools based on preference) for just some rough data.</p>

7

<p>Alex: I would say St. Paul’s is above Milton. Milton and Nobles are about the same in academics so are tied at #4 followed by BH and BBN. In fact some may say Nobles could be superior to Milton as Nobles start in the 7th grade while Milton is K-12 with additional kids accepted in the 4th, 6th and 9th grade. It would be difficult to judge whether a kid is “academically inclined” in Kindergarden while one is able to judge more from the ISEE scores at 7th grade.</p>