<p>S#2 is toying with the idea of attending boarding school his last two years of HS. He would need major financial assistance. He does soccor and crew and an amazing amount of community service. Has a 3.9, takes the tioughest courses, and is a member of the NHSociety. </p>
<p>I know nothing about the HS prep schools and seek information about the campus culture (drugs? drinking? diversity? interaction between different racial/socio-economic groups?) and financial generosity of some of these schools.
Can anyone help? Sidwell friends, Lawrence, Choate, Andover, and Gilman are five schools he has mentioned. Any other suggestions are welcomed and appreciated.</p>
<p>in January. Both have financial aid (but Exeter's has more limited funds, thus admissions are "more competitive" for financial aid applicants) and both are strongly committed to student body diversity. I'm still trying to find out the answers to your questions about campus culture. It would be cool if our kids both ended up at the same school.</p>
<p>Exeter--by contrast with Andover--explicitly says it is NOT need-blind in admissions. I have looked it up on Exeter's</a> Web site many times, as we definitely cannot afford to pay list price for Exeter. Exeter tells applicants that it provides financial aid, up to full rides for some admittees, but that admission is "more competitive" for applicants who need financial aid, because it has not yet met the fund-raising</a> goals necessary to endow its financial aid so that all applicants are on an equal footing (as Andover claims its applicants are). </p>
<p>I have read, by the way, that Exeter's endowment DECLINED in value by one-third during the 1970s, when the trustees kept too much of the endowment in stocks at a time the stock market was dropping. Maybe Andover had more financially shrewd trustees in those days.</p>
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*because it has not yet met the fund-raising goals necessary to endow its financial aid so that all applicants are on an equal footing (as Andover claims its applicants are).
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*</p>
<p>I have never read this.......been told this. Where did you get this information?</p>
<p>Check out St. Andrew's School, De. Academically very rigorous, very strong crew (they're right on the water), and very generous with financial aid. The school was established specifically so that students from all walks of life could be afforded a boarding school education. However, very small...only 270 students, but everyone lives at school.
Community service is also stressed there. Not just to the local community, but to the worldwide community.</p>
<p>hehehe......done. I am involved and have NO knowledge of not meeting goals. In fact we have met goals earlier than projected and major donations have been higher than dreamed. To tell you the truth I feel a bit defensive and shocked at the statements posted. AWK</p>
<p>Yeah, I'm just quoting what I read on Exeter's Web site. (I provided two links in my last post.) The dead-tree materials I have received in the mail from Exeter tell the same story about financial aid as it relates to admission chances. Both schools give full rides to some applicants, and both participate actively in such class affirmative action programs for low-income young people as ABC and Prep for Prep. I won't know for a few months how our family fares in applying for financial aid at each school or, for that matter, how my son fares in applying for admission.</p>
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**The good news is that Exeter has more students than ever before receiving financial assistance, and the Academy would like to accept even more qualified applicants. The difficulty is that this poses a tremendous financial challenge for the Academy. The solution, paired with responsible fiscal management, is to increase Exeters endowment resources for financial aid. The Financial Aid Initiative aims to raise $70 million, which will provide an additional $3 million to the financial aid budget on a yearly basis. This will allow Exeter to move the percentage of students on aid from roughly 34 percent each year to 40 percent and to accept all of the best qualified students.
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**</p>
<p>The Exeter Initiative to raise $305 million over 5 years. Financial Aid is $70mil. This campaign is sightly **under a year *old and 65% of the total has been met and *53% of the $70mil for financial aid**. I cannot imagine this being viewed as a problem raising funds. With that in mind raising funds for scholarship is always a challenge and Exonnians wish that every student could attend without cost. Please know that the cost of a year is not met by tuition expense. Each student is underwritten by the endowment.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the suggestions so far. Will definitely look into St. Andrews as Delaware is close enough for him to come home weekends (or us to visit.) Also, I included Sidwell Friends because it is close to home and is a dayschool. I don't come from a tradition of shipping kids away from home to school and in fact am not at all comfortable even considering it with this S because he is a love and fun to be around - so Sidwell and Gilman seem are a compromise. On the other hand, if he finds a school that fits his academic, social, and atheltic needs/interests and genuinely wants to try it out...then I guess it's a big hug, a pat on the back, and keeping busy making care packages.</p>
<p>But having had alot of friends and acquaintances that did attend/or whose children attend(ed) boarding schools, I am all too familiar with what goes on there - in some places, the kids grow up way too fast for my taste - or arrive there already doing what thirty year olds do. That's why I am hoping someone can fill me in on "campus culture"</p>
<p>crash: good luck to your son. I'm sure he is a competitive applicant to any school he chooses to apply toward, and I'm sure he'll end up somewhere great.</p>
<p>About Andover: the drinking and drug scene are present (just like in any other high school), but they can be easily avoided and they by no means dominate social life. diversity is pretty big in terms of race, but I'll be honest, it does sometimes seem like everyone you meet is from 1. Massachusetts, 2. New York, and 3. California. it's not a problem at all, it just gets a little old sometimes. (that being said there was a huge portion of kids from places I've never been to in my life: Alaska, Oregon, and the numerous foreign countries). in terms of the socio-economic thing, everyone hangs out with everyone. money just isn't brought up too much on campus since it's just not a huge deal. one of my friends owns the Arizona Cardinals and I didn't know until a month ago.</p>
<p>Gilman: one of my dormmates is an alumnus of their middle school. i could do some research if you'd like?</p>
<p>Sidwell: I don't know very much about the school but being from DC I do pick up some threads. The consensus is that it's the school where all the Democratic Senators and high-end foreign diplomats (and other "haves" of the DC area) send their kids, but I don't know whether or not that's true. It does have outstanding academics however, that much cannot be disputed, and its sports are respectable, but no means as competitive as some other DC school (like Dematha for example). </p>
<p>I would check out Lawrenceville, near Princeton. I know an URM who took a post graduate year there and loved it. He was a very good soccer player. St. Andrews is great. You can expect Exeter to be a pretty big adjustment going as a junior. It is a tough school for kids to adjust to and the food is terrible. Choate is OK in that it has lots of URM. I hear lots of kids leave Choate on the weekends. Deerfield is great but rather remote. My favorite school is St. Paul's in Concord, NH. They are awash in financial aid money. St. Paul's is far away, but it is easy to fly from Manchester NH. Milton Academy is a first rate school and has a mix of day and boarding students. Andover is also excellent.</p>
<p>By the way, I just cleared out my private message box because I notice some people are trying to PM me about boarding schools. I'm not sure which thread the last attempted PM came from, but maybe it was this one. I'm glad to hear information from anyone.</p>
<p>Demarius -
I have heard similar things about Exeter being difficult to enter in junior year - why is that? Also, why is St. Paul's such a favorite? What are the students like there? Outdoorsy? Down-to-Earth? Unpretentious? That's what I am hopinmg to find for him.</p>