<p>1) How far away are you willing to let your child go to school? We currently live in the Deep South/Gulf Coast area, and we aren't sure about distance. D will have to go a decent ways away simply because there are no good boarding schools in the area (if there are any at all). Will that make an impact (positive or negative) on admissions? If so, how much of one?</p>
<p>2) Do you take younger children on tours/interviews/etc? We have several younger children, and numbers 2 and 3 will have their turns for boarding school in the next couple of years, while the youngest is still in arms. What has your experience been? Do you have any advice?</p>
<p>3) What schools do you know of that have a more conservative vibe? We're not looking for a bastion of conservatism, but we do want something that doesn't have a reputation for being extremely leftist. We certainly want D to be exposed to other viewpoints, but we would also like to know that she isn't being exposed to one and only one viewpoint (either conservative or liberal).</p>
<p>We are fairly new to this, and we have no idea where to start, so we're trying to take it one step at a time.</p>
As the schools are keen to have a diverse student body, hailing from an under-represented state is a positive. Coming from, say Mississippi, will not guarantee admission, it but may get the application a second or third look. The applicant still has to be qualified. </p>
<p>Under-represented states are generally those that are far away from the school’s home state and have small populations. Because California is such a populous state, there are a lot of CA kids in the east coast boarding schools. So despite the distance from the east coast, CA is generally not under-represented. </p>
<p>We are int’l, so were willing to let child got to school VERY far away.</p>
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Quite a few families bring younger siblings along on tours. Just be aware that the WHOLE family is being observed, so it is important for all to be on best behavior. A BS tour would not be a good time to yell at younger child for having a hissy fit. The advantage of having both parents visit is that it demonstrates to the school that both parents are supportive of the idea of BS. </p>
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My perception is that among the top schools, the higher the percentage of full-pay kids, the greater the likelihood for the the student body to lean to the right (i.e. think children of affluent investment bankers, CEO’s, doctors, etc). At my S’s east coast school, the mock presidential election among the students yielded a 50:50 Obama:Romney split. Keep in mind that that the teachers will generally lean to the left.</p>
<p>Just to give you another viewpoint, our home is about 2,000 miles from the East Coast where my children went to school (my youngest is still attending–I can tell you, the empty house this go 'round is harder to take). To me the distance was a big negative but in light of all the fabulous positives, it did not stand a chance.</p>
<p>I do not recall seeing a single younger sibling when we toured and interviewed. Of course that is just my one-person sample. However, if I had a younger child nearing BS age and interested in BS, I would not hesitate to take them along. That’s assuming they are mature enough to maintain their demeanor. It could get quite boring for them and it wouldn’t do to slouch lazily in the waiting room, yawn, etc.</p>
<p>As far as politics, I can’t help you much there except to say, learn to read between the lines of websites, reviews, brochures, etc. Look at the list of student organizations. Look at what student awards and recognitions are featured in the school newspaper, magazine, and website.</p>
<p>I think GMTplus7’s comments about full pay vs. FA being related to political leanings are valid. I’m going to guess that stricter dress code, frequency of formal dinners, and required religious services may be correlated with political leanings, but I’m just throwing that out as a shortcut to doing a first sort, say at boarding school review.com.</p>
<p>We took our younger child with us, he is 9. When it was time to interview parents, he and his sister stayed in the waiting room, and he took the tour with us which is guided by a student. It was not a problem.</p>
<p>We took our very mature 8 year old on a school tour due to the travel schedule involved and he was interested. It had a very positive out come for him. He happened to really love the school and it prepared him for an upcoming tour of his own at a local day school.</p>
<p>I would be very aware of what your children can handle. A long drive coupled with a long day that may not involve them could be difficult on you and your applicant child. My son did not come along to any other tours or open houses because he was not interested and we felt it would be hard on his sister to feel calm and focused if he were fussy or bored.</p>
<p>While bringing along one or two siblings who are old enough to behave is one thing, having 3 (or more?) siblings along, one of whom is still a baby or toddler, might make it difficult to pay attention to the school visit and interview process, so you should just be aware of that limitation when you make your decisions.</p>
<p>As to how far away - we’re on the other side of the country from DD’s school. I would love it if she could come home for long weekends and we could go see her perform or play in games sometimes, but other than that the distance hasn’t felt worse for us than for someone a little closer. I did consider airport accessibility in the original choice of schools to consider, figuring that I didn’t want to add a 2+ hour drive from an airport to the cross country trip. And by “airport” I mean one that has direct flights to and from San Francisco - I avoid layovers whenever possible.</p>
<p>Distance may not be as big a factor as you think.</p>
<p>Our daughter is 2000 miles away, and so far we have seen her once a month (except September). Parents weekends tend to be during the “off” months (October and April) and I made a quick visit in February. They’re home for breaks in November, December, January, and March.</p>
<p>Her school does not allow boarders to go home on “closed weekends,” which are every other weekend.</p>
<p>Distance: Ask your child a bit about the distance. Consider issues also like getting home and if they are ‘good’ with flying, changing planes, etc. How much exposure have they had to this? One of ours HATES to fly. This, of course, would limit options!</p>
<p>Visits with Family Along: Dh took our daughter on the first go round (he ‘senses’ things better than I do and will ask the tough questions) With second visits, I went too and younger sibling usually came</p>
<p>Conservative/Liberal: Not sure about conservative schools (maybe some in the NC/SC area???). But I can tell you that Quaker/Friends schools tend to be really liberal (which is fine by me…but you would likely NOT want that situation as the conservative beliefs are respected but not presented much, in my experience).</p>
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<li>Our child leaped to boarding school halfway across the country (by her own choice), and then took another leap to live abroad for a year. As a high school student. That’s about as extreme as you can get. And we’d do it again in a heartbeat. Scary for her, scary for us, but ultimately we emerged so much stronger and her worldview and international friendships are strong and ongoing, I can’t imagine why we had any doubts in the first place.</li>
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<p>But as with all things, it just depends on the student involved. One person’s solution may not necessarily be good fit for another.</p>
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<li>We have seen some families on tour. It’s not common, but it does happen. In a way, it makes sense, getting younger siblings comfortable with the idea a family member might be leaving. Demystifies the process. If you’re going to try to do it pre-application tours are a good time, because revisit days (after acceptance letters are sent) are limited to the parents and admitted student.<br></li>
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<p>If you plan to fly, it helps to pick schools within an hour of a major airport, to minimize connections going and coming, and adding long hours of bus travel to transport time. Hotchkiss is a great school that is famously difficult to get to with public transportation, for example, so the kids depend on scheduled shuttle buses taking hours from campus to airports for major vacations, and have few options for a weekend get away. </p>
<p>Loomis Chafee, in contrast, is very convenient (right outside Hartford Conn.), 5 minutes from airport with shuttle service 24/7.</p>
<p>We have six children aged from 13 years to 5 months. My in-laws live very close to us and would gladly take the younger children for a few days while we visit schools. It sounds like we should be fine taking our second and third with us, but the youngest three should stay with their grandparents.</p>
<p>We will most likely be flying if we’re leaving the area, so we’ll also look into schools that have easy access to airports. Mountainhiker, thank you for the suggestion! We will be looking into Indian Springs. D is pretty good with flying, so she should be okay.</p>
<p>Would you tour schools during the school year, or wait until the summer? I think it would make more sense to tour during the school year, but that would mean pulling any children coming out of school for a few days. What would you suggest?</p>
<p>Hope this helps. Determining factors will include time and money available for multiple trips vs. only one. If you can only make one trip, try to do it when school is in session. Boarding school calendars are often quite different from other schools, so you may be able to find a time when your local school is off for a few days but boarding schools are in session.</p>
<p>This is a handy resource: The Association of Boarding Schools (TABS) publishes a school directory in magazine form. The magazine has a very useful, large, fold-out map of the U.S., which has all the BS’s located on it. </p>
<p>You’ve probabaly already guessed that there is a sizable geographic concentration of BS around BOS airport. There is also a sizable concentration around BDL airport. Most schools will offer shuttle buses to the airports for breaks. </p>
<p>There are rental car companies that will allow u w/o a fee to pick up a car in BOS and drop off at BDL, so you don’t have to back-track.</p>