Q&A about The Hotchkiss School

Prep School Admissions
21

I like the food, but food is not a huge deal to me. I know if you were to ask other students, they would say they love the food.

The main food option is the dining hall. I would describe the food service as deliberate, healthy, fresh and lots of variety. In addition to the dining hall we also have a snack shop which serves items such as burgers and fries (my kind of food). Local delivery options are also available.

To give you a feel of deliberate:

“Dining Services, Real Food is our guiding principle. Menus are based on the seasonality and availability of regional products, and food offerings are varied and rotate based on nature’s bounty. We work with local farms and companies to procure produce grown using sustainable and organic practices, like the vegetables that come from our own Fairfield Farm. To preserve the quality of these premium products, fruits and vegetables are prepared fresh and served in the smallest possible batches.

We take the same approach with our protein. Hotchkiss Dining has pioneered a local whole animal program, which allows us to purchase steer, hogs, lamb, chicken and duck directly from local farmers. We work with a third-party verified humane USDA slaughterhouse to custom cut and process our meat — which, to date, has allowed us to redirect more than $100,000 into our local economy.

All of our chicken is antibiotic-free, and all the pork we use is regionally sourced and gestation-crate free. For the 2017-18 academic year, we’re committed to using exclusively regional, grass-fed beef, and we’re working towards a goal of 100% sustainably sourced seafood.

Our kitchen never uses chemically preserved prepared foods. Stocks are prepared in-house, salad dressings are homemade, and all foods are prepared fresh daily by our staff. MSG and other chemical additives are never allowed in the preparation of our foods.

By sourcing wholesome products and cooking them in-house, we can ensure healthy practices are used to create our dishes. Because we make everything ourselves, we can ensure that foods marked as allergy-safe are truly gluten-, dairy-, soy-, nut-, and meat-free. Healthy nutritional choices and vegetarian entrée are available at every meal. We even believe fried food can be made healthier by using only non-hydrogenated canola oil to minimize trans-fatty acids in our foods.”

22

Is there a place for students to grab a snack or a drink between meals - whether it be a piece of fruit or something more substantial - that is included in the food plan? or is the only option the snack bar at an extra cost?

23

The dining hall always has fruit and water available.

24

Thanks for all your insider information! If you could, would you mind sharing what kind of school you came from before Hotchkiss, and what the hardest part of the transition has been for you?

Also, a question about technology - I believe Hotchkiss issues laptops, correct? if so, which one or ones, and is it one that is your to keep or do you turn it in and get a new one every year?

25

To start with your first question, I came from a public middle school. Overall, the transition to Hotchkiss was very smooth and I experienced little to no difficulty. The one thing that was clear from the start was the variance in educational opportunity prior to attending Hotchkiss. Having come from a public school, I quickly noticed some of these discrepancies, which included math placement, instrumental proficiency, as well as language.

Indeed, Hotchkiss does issues laptops. In previous years they handed out Macbook Pros, but have made the transition to Macbook Airs. And yes, students do keep their laptops each year. We do have an IT department which is always available for fixing any issues with your laptop.

26

do you use a docking station for your laptop with a large monitor in your room to make it easier on your eyes?

Is there anything you would recommend new students bring that isn’t listed on all the checklists, whether it be technology related or something else?

Again - thank you for taking the time to do this!

27

I do not but its a good idea. I can’t really think of anything else other than headphones and cup of noodles. Of course personal preference so maybe someone else can respond.

28

another question, what is the distance from the floor to the bottom of the bed frame on the beds at Hotchkiss?

29

The beds are height adjustable. Of the beds I’ve seen, I believe the lowest it goes is approximately 2 feet and as high as 5 feet. Great for storage, couch space, etc.

30

@torn2020 thanks for the detailed info

31

Hi there, I have a question for you. If you had to guess, or actually know, approximately how may AP courses does the average Hotchkiss student end up taking through out high school. Just curious. TY

32

@SherBran67 I attend Berkshire school, which is about 20 minutes away from Hotchkiss. Berkshire has a very developed ski program and students who ski at hotchkiss will ski with the Berkshire students and go with them in the afternoons because hotchkiss doesn’t offer a ski program. Your daughter could for sure continue to ski and she would just go with the other Hotchkiss kids. It’s definitely been done before!

33

In terms of APs, every kid is different. My daughter ended up with about 7, I think, but 1-2 she self studied rather than taking the related class.

34

I second what HMom16 wrote. Wide disparity, depending on the student. 4-6 is probably typical. Some do more, some do less. Hotchkiss has some things they do in the first two years of programming that throws kids off some of the traditional course selection routes students take in other schools.

For example, there is prep (9th grade) year science. It is a general science overview with emphasis on learning general science principles and how to do labs. That means your student will either 1)only get to take one of each (biology, chemistry, physics) of 3 years of science at the “regular” level. 2) take a science specialty (biology, chemistry, physics) and then take the AP version of that specialty in a subsequent year, which means ending up after 4 years with one year of general science, two years in one concentration (biology, physics, chemistry) and one year in a second concentration. Basically you have to choose to either study each of the three concentrations OR to take the regular, then an AP in one of them and then only cover one other concentration. It is possible to jump straight into AP in science and while it is possible to do, it is debatable whether there is as much value in one AP year compared to one regular year of a concentration followed by one AP year in it.

Another challenge to a typical curriculum run is that Hotchkiss students follow the Hotchkiss humanities curriculum their first two years. English, history, philosophy and the arts (music, studio, photography, theatre, dance) are taken in a standardized offering. Students choose their art, but the English, History and Philosophy are the same for all. It makes it harder to get to specialized course work or concentrations, and the common history curriculum stronger sophomore often students take, which includes AP European History or APUSH, does not happen in the same time frame if at all.

The education is rigorous but on paper does not necessarily show that it is.