Hi,
I was admitted to Lawrenceville but just had a few questions.
I’ve looked all over their website but cannot find a schedule of their clubs (as in when each club meets and what day). I would greatly appreciate it if someone could tell me where to find this information.
If I wanted to start a club at Lawrenceville, what would the process be like? Who would I ask? How difficult is it?
My school is different than most other schools in the U.S. because we take physics in 9th grade. In my current school, I have made it to AP Chemistry, a very difficult class full of mostly juniors and seniors (not sophomores). With that said, I would like to take Chem Honors (AP Chem) next year at Lawrenceville (not regular Chemistry). I know that it is very difficult to skip but if I could show my qualifications, is it possible and has anyone done it in the past?
@ljyx1000 - congratulations on your acceptance to Lawrenceville! Could you tell us what grade you’re in now? And did you mean to say “we take Physics in 9th grade”? Or 8th grade? Because most of the schools that I know of offer Physics in 9th…
@GMC2918 Thank you! I am currently a 9th grader and am entering Lawrenceville as a 3rd Former. I did not know that most schools offered Physics in 9th grade. All of the public schools I know offer it for 11th grade so that is news to me. The thing is that at Lawrenceville, biology is the class for 2nd formers (9th graders) and the regular science class for 10th grade is a mixture of chemistry and physics, which I think would be a bit slow paced for me considering I have already covered AP Physics I. I was just wondering if it were possible to take Chemistry Honors as a 3rd former. Thank you
@ljyx1000 – I asked a lot of questions about science at the Lawrenceville revisit from both the department head and the academic dean. The response I got was that all 9th graders take the 9th grade science and all 10th grader take the 10th grade science and there is no deviation from this regardless of background, experience, prior classes, or interests. My child chose a different school because of not wanting to repeat years of science already done.
We had an issue with this no credit for previous work at L’Ville. My son will be a repeat freshman fall, he is taking honors bio now, taking the Bio SAT II next month but L’ville said he would need to retake bio next fall. I just don’t see this benefiting anyone. That said, he will be attending another boarding school who was much more understanding about which science he can take fall. I totally understand the benefit of students taking the same humanities as all the students in their grade but not math, foreign language and science. That’s what placement tests, teacher recs and past academic records are for.
@kaibab3@LifeLongNYer@karen0 thank you for all of your responses. I have heard that Lawrenceville is particularly strict about people skipping a science class and having spoken with the department head at revisit day he said that the point of some of the core classes before Chemistry Honors would be to not only learn the subject but to also instill skills such as using tests of analysis (paired t-test, 1-way ANOVA, Pearson’s Correlation, etc.). The thing is that I am currently also in science research, where we have learned all of this so I feel that I have all the prerequisites to skip the course…if anyone has skipped a grade in the past please let me know the process. Thank you
@karen0 I really don’t understand why schools don’t offer leveled English and history as well. It’s hardly as if all students have similar background in those fields. While it’s possible that some of the material would be new, there are many levels of capacity to have useful conversation and interaction about a text. I imagine students who are seniors are having deeper discussions than 9th graders and students in grad school poetry seminars are having yet deeper discussions. If a child is ready for the higher level discussion, it is frustrating not to have access to it. My child has given up on thinking that the humanities will be very exciting at boarding school due to this practice of everyone doing the same thing, but at least all boarding schools we’ve looked at are the same in this regard. For science, Lawrenceville was a real outlier and the only school we looked that required repeating years of science already done.
@ljyx1000 Good luck! I was told there would be no exceptions and it was absolutely irrelevant what the student had completed previously. It wasn’t a question of having had only some of the material, it was a question of wanting all 9th graders to do the same thing. My kid would have been forced to take two years of science that were prerequisites for courses already completed. Completing AP tests, even with 5s, was specifically addressed by the academic dean as having no impact on science placement.
Many schools do offer leveled courses in English and History. For example, Deerfield does, but usually starting Junior year. Math, English, and Science courses are leveled starting Freshman year.
No, but that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. And sometimes there are kind of not-officially-honors classes that are essentially honors. For example, there’s one sophomore English teacher whose class is so much more challenging than the other sophomore classes at Deerfield that even the teachers call it “that essentially honors class.” But that requires knowing the teachers and the advisors pretty well, so it really DOESN’T happen in Freshman year. They do give you a choice in terms of what history class you take, so you can pursue your interests (Western Civ, Africa and Latin America, Asian history, or Big History). That whole L’ville science thing sound very strange-- at Deerfield, and many BS I’ve heard of, kids absolutely get placed in leveled science and math classes, based on placement exams, previous courses taken, and teacher recommendations. They definitely don’t have you repeat courses if you show you’ve had the material. I think Exeter has one required math class, but then you’re placed and can go as fast and far as you like.
@Daykidmom would this mean that in 11th grade, I would take an honors course based on my two previous years? It is frustrating to know that even if all the prerequisites are met, one cannot skip in 9th and 10th grade.
I don’t know, ljyx1000. I don’t quite get how Lawrenceville works, and it’s clearly different from other schools. Yes, by Junior year, they would have two years of grades to determine honors-- but I don’t know to what extent they would also count previous classes. At Deerfield (where my son goes), the regular order is Physic in 9th, Chemistry in 10th, both of which have regular, accelerated, and AP levels. Then you take bio at whatever level or AP Physics I or AP Physics C or any of a whole bunch of upper sciences which require at least a chem course as a pre-req. But if you’ve had physics or chemistry already, they wouldn’t make you redo in 9th and 10th. Clearly Lawrenceville is different, and the above posters seem to be saying you have to do those 9th and 10th grade courses. You know, you can always look up the chair of the Science Dept. and write him an email explaining your background and asking the question. There’s nothing wrong with asking legitimate questions and expressing interest in the subject.
When I was researching boarding schools a few years ago, and I asked the question, I was told that there is no way around this; all 9th and 10th graders take the same science classes. Armed with that information, one can choose whether to apply or not. If you’ve applied and been admitted, feel free to ask the question, but I doubt that you will get a different response.
This is often asked by somebody who has not actually taken an English and/or a history class at a boarding school. I’m not saying these schools are better or worse than any other, but all 9th grade Fall classes at Exeter and Fall 9th grade English/history classes at Andover are graded pass/fail in order to give students time to adjust to the rigor. Many students before they enter always think they they are the special snowflake (and in many ways they are), only to meet their match with the “non-honors” humanities classes.
My daughter’s public high school (not too far from Lawrenceville) places all freshmen in a combined chemistry/ physics course as well. I wonder whether it is a regional thing. However, the public high school has block scheduling, meaning the introductory course eats up only half the year.
@mrnephew I just didn’t want to sign up for clubs that met during the same time. Does this mean that I can sign up for whatever clubs I want to without having to worry about schedule issues?
No, it means that if two clubs end up meeting at the same time, you talk with the president and see if you can move the meeting, which they’d be reasonable in dealing with, and if nothing can be arranged then you’d have to choose between the clubs.