Starting a list of schools for our son.....

Prep School Admissions Prep School Parents
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Now that I think our daughter is finally settling into life at BS, it’s time to turn the focus onto our son. It is clear to us now that we approached our daughter’s BS application process incorrectly. Thankfully, she ended up at a great school. But I’d like to start our son’s BS journey on the right foot with eyes that are open a bit wider, and more time spent really getting to know these schools.

He’s currently in 7th grade at a private K-12 school that he started this year. Yes it’s early, but one of the main things we learned last time is that our daughter / we did not know enough about the schools before her tour/interview. I really wish there was an option to do a tour early on and then an interview later so kids can process the info a bit more, and research things they want to get more info on. But I digress.

He is very mathematically talented, but struggles with reading and writing. He has two learning disorders which we are currently working on, but reading/writing will probably never be his strong suit. His math skills are quite impressive, but he often rushes through work so his grades don’t alway reflect his ability. He is in Honors Algebra 1 this year, so he’ll have honors geometry as an 8th grader. His report card tends to be As and A-s but that is a bit up in the air with his new school as we don’t quite know how they grade and it’s more academically rigorous than his previous private school. Either way, we still expect mostly As, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he had a B or two. He took the mid level SSAT last spring for admittance into his current school and scored 97% in math and something awful like 45% in verbal. He will need to work on that. One major issue academically? He’s not super hard working. He does what he needs to get by, but isn’t going above and beyond to impress anyone. But he’s a really nice, well behaved kid. Because he’s very quiet at school, I worry about teacher recommendations (new school plus shy kid…). He plays three sports a year at school: soccer, lax, tennis, and has played rec/club lax but has taken a year off. Right now, he’s in no sports bcs of covid. He’s a good player, but not a stand out in any sport. We could work on this over the next 12 months too as he’d way rather be on a playing field than in class. He’s played saxophone for two years in the school band, but because wind instruments aren’t allowed this year (covid again), he’s learning classical guitar for “band”. I’m not sure which of these he will continue next year, I’m hoping both. He participated in student government at his old school, but again may be too shy to run this year. He also spends three weeks at summer camp in Maine, except for last summer because, again, of covid. I love this kid to pieces, but he’s not our “shoot for the stars” BS kid.

Things we are looking for in his school: location, location location. Since we are a plane ride away from every boarding school, our daughter is in NJ, and we have family in NJ and Rhode Island, we’d love to keep our search in the NJ/CT/RI area. Maybe southern Mass too. Schools we will definitely look at are Lville (sister is there), Taft (close cousin is there), and St. George’s. Of these, I think SGS would be the best fit for him. Obviously Lville and Taft would be major reaches for him. Even if he got in, I’m not sure he’d enjoy the faster pace of a school like Lville, so it’s possible he will not apply there. So I’m really looking to add more schools that are similar to SGS. Tabor comes to mind (but a bit of a stretch distance wise from NJ) and Westminster too, but I know very little about either of them. I’d also appreciate honest thoughts on his ability to get into SGS/Tabor/Westy etc. The only other “checklist” requirement is a high percentage of boarders, since he won’t be able to head home every weekend. And for admissions purposes, he will be full pay.

Also, what would your suggestions be to strengthen his application? SSAT work is obviously necessary and he already meets with a tutor once a week to improve his writing. As a side note, his current school is a stickler for good writing skills, so we are hoping to see big strides in that over the school year. Any other areas he should work on over the next 18 months?

I look forward to your suggestions!

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This isn’t what you want to hear but jeez- this sounds like an awful lot for a kid who just switched schools. He’s got two LD’s, plays three sports, is picking up a second musical instrument, and you’re wondering how to strengthen his application when he’s ALREADY getting tutored once a week for writing?

Does HE want more work strengthening his application? He sounds like a terrific kid even if you perceive him to be lazy and nothing special in athletics.

This sounds like more than enough for his transitional year into a new private school- let him get his sea legs before you figure out what hoops he needs to jump through to get into boarding school???

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@blossom, @cityran has done this rodeo once already and is asking these questions from experience with her daughter’s successful hoop-jumping and is returning to the collective institutional wisdom offered by the community here to help her and her son craft a targeted list of boarding schools that might fit his unique shape, which appears to be very different from her daughter’s. Because there is an athletic component to all boarding schools, offering his athletic experience is quite relevant, and knowing where he is strong and where he struggles (and if there are any LDs) is even more relevant as it will be critical in choosing those schools best suited to address those strengths and weaknesses and LDs if there are any.

From what she posted, she and her son already know that boarding school would be a good high school option for him, so she’s sharing all those things about him that are relevant to those here who can evaluate that portrait and help her start her “son’s BS journey on the right foot with eyes that are open a bit wider.” That’s how the process starts on this board.

7th grade is not too early to start targeting (I sure wish we had come to this process better informed), and it sounds like the son is on board, so they have plenty of unhurried time to start learning about schools that were not a consideration for her daughter. At this stage, learning about boarding schools that might fit his profile is not going to interfere with his middle school experience or be an undue burden.

@cityran, I can’t help much other than to say that you can certainly tour schools without interviewing (@buuzn can comment there; I believe she started looking with her 7th grade daughter), but COVID is complicating and changing this process, so it looks like virtual tours and, later, Zoom/Skype, etc. interviews are the model. I know you will get a lot of helpful suggestions from current BS parents who are closer to this process than I now am and who can give you some excellent suggestions.

Good luck this round getting to know a broader list of schools.

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Have you checked out the thread:

http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/prep-school-parents/2056180-schools-with-academic-support-p1.html

It would seem relevant to your request.

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Thank you for the quick responses. On paper it does seem like our son has a lot on his plate but in actuality he has a ton of free time right now as he’s not doing a fall sport and we don’t do much these days outside of school anyway. So I figured if anyone noticed some glaring holes in his credentials, we could spend some time now working on them. I do think he’s already a very well rounded kid and a great candidate for BS.

I mention the LDs not because he needs a school that is specifically for LDs but because when we toured with our daughter, some of the schools (Taft and SGS) included a stop at the learning center and talked quite a bit about how helpful it is to students, whereas others made no mention of extra help and/or LDs. We obviously want a school that is open to and encourages students to use their academic centers.

Off to check the academic support thread!

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While you may not need a school that focus on his LD (Forman comes to mind), you’ll definitely want to find a school that has a solid learning center where they will follow up on his accommodations. Is he interested in any all-boys schools? If so, you may want to take a look at Trinity Pawling (on the NY and CT border about 1.5 hours from NYC and on the train line). Another option might be Canterbury - they have a great learning center. Maybe Dublin and Wesstown, too, as I understand they have good academic support, too. Good luck!

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I might suggest that you look at all the schools near L’ville. Two are primarily day with boarding (mostly international) but have great learning support - Hun and Pennington. (Hun is better with visual processing issues and Pennington is known for supporting kids with auditory processing issues.) George is about 20 minutes west and Peddie is about 20 minutes east. Two different vibes but both excellent schools. Both have reputations for welcoming different types of learners. George is very strong at STEM and doesn’t seem worried about “uneven” kids. You’d be able to visit when you visit your D (soon, non-Covid). Hill isn’t so far either.

One thing I would toss into the search is finding the structure that would work best for your son. Personally, I don’t think it’s unusual for a 7th grade boy to do work just to get it done. I wouldn’t characterize him as lazy for this!

Schools differ in how much freedom they provide around study halls, etc. Some kids abhor the structure and even rebel against it while others get nothing done without it. Most kids work it out one way or another, but for some, this is critical.

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How about Mercersburg? It’s no farther away from you than schools in CT or RI would be. It is in the MAPL league, meaning it competes against Lvillie, Peddie, Blair, Hun and others in your area. Strong learning center, not an athletic powerhouse (meaning a good (but not necessarily great) athlete can make significant contributions to our varsity teams), not a pressure cooker - everyone can find their passion and work at their pown pace, and a place that loves nice kids. We’ve got 440 of them! :wink:

Good luck; I have no doubt he’ll find a successful place to land, as did sister.

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My DS has a friend who sounds very similar to your son, and he is very happy at St. George’s so I think you are probably on the right track. The other schools kids with similar profile we know landed at are Blair and Millbrook, and also Trinity-Pawling if he is open to single sex environment. Westminster also seems to be open to a lot wider range of kids but everyone we know there is a serious athlete. But that’s my impression of Taft too, in fact I have been told Westy is a slightly less competitive and gentler version of Taft. Definitely worth looking at if Taft is on your list.

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My very bright ADHD son thrived at Millbrook. He too did the minimum to get by, generally. I feel they rfeally see the whole kid. My son’s academic profile would have been enough to get him into more rigorous schools but he would have been crushed there. I don’t think those schools really are set up to deal with kids that have issues, unless those issues are very superficial. I also think a smaller school allows kids to not fall through cracks.

I believe there are other schools that fit this profile, but I am only familiar with Millbrook. Plus Millbrook is the only high school in the country to have an accredited zoo on campus, which can be life changing for some students. (Not my son!). I am happy to try to answer any questions anyone has about Millbrook.

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So to the OP. I just had to laugh since it was like you are describing my son in 7th grade. He was /is a math kid. Did honors geometry in 8th with 12 other kids. Poor in reading /writing which seems typical for math kids… Lol… He had some tutoring and it helped but it was also more mental maturity. We went public. I don’t understand boarding schools and not why I am here. I just want you to know my son is a senior in college graduating in engineering and writes and reads great. He’s an excellent speaker also. This part gets better. He used to read so slow and had a comprehension issue. Get help with the comprehension if it’s an issue. Again, he was just like that in 7th grade… Lol

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I know a bunch of kids who attended Westy including my nephew who graduated in the spring and I am good friends with an alum as well as a few board members. The kids that I know who attended had a good experience there. I’m not sure that I’d compare it to Taft though. It is considerably smaller and has a fairly high day student component. That may be a plus or a minus. Another nephew graduated from Taft two years ago. It’s a more competitive place. If you end up leaning a bit larger than Westy with a similar student body to Taft but with a bit easier admissions and solid educational support I’d look at Kent. I’m biased because I attended as did my son, class of '17. Kent helped him develop his interest in math and science and he’s now a senior in college studying Chemical Engineering. I know a bit about Hotchkiss too, having had a son and daughter attend there, but it’s more like Taft. If you have any questions about it, pm me. FWIW, my neighbor’s son graduated from Millbrook last spring and I couldn’t be more impressed with the support that they provided and his evolution over the years there.

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My son is 2E. (Gifted +LD), so we did a ton of research and visits before choosing a school. We did open houses starting in 7th grade. Although many aren’t doing in person open houses this year, it may work in your favor that they are digital considering you are a plane ride away. Open houses were a great way to learn about a bunch of schools without the pressure of an in-person interview. I loved that many of them had panels which is something you usually don’t get until accepted student day if you only do personal tours. We learned more useful general information at open houses (especially about their academic support) than we did on tours, so it was useful for us as and we could then craft more specific questions for the schools we were interested in. I also felt it helped DS in interviews to have more knowledge about the school before he had in-person interviews and, just like college recruitment, it shows that you have a true interest in the school rather than just “checking it out” and sticking around for an interview because you flew in.

I would focus on the academic support components of the schools you are looking at. Boarding school is such a wonderful experience but if you are really struggling academically how much of the things that are wonderful about it will you have the bandwidth to truly enjoy? I was hesitant to pick schools that considered “academic support” to be student run tutoring. That might be acceptable for kids that just need a tutor because they missed something in class or it goes a bit fast for them, but not someone with an identified learning disability that needs specific interventions, remediation or accommodations.

As your son has 2 identified LD’s, I’m assuming you’ve had a neuropsych done. I found it helpful to send my son’s neuropsych to the director of academic support at the schools we were interested in to see if he was a good fit for the school. Not only did I get good feedback about the services that they were able to provide, but how they could also accommodate him in the most challenging classes. It gave me a really good feel for if my son would be comfortable with the people he was working with and how the program was integrated into the school. (We is a kid that HATES to be identified in anyway as having an LD).

I know it’s outside of your geographic area, but your son sounds like a perfect fit for New Hampton. I just checked their website and they have a few digital events coming up. It might be a good low stakes way to see if you might want to add them to your list. And if you end up considering heading north, I’d also check out NMH, Suffield and possibly Kimball-Union. Kimball Union seems to have an ongoing series of virtual admission events that look really interesting.

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@vwlizard Thank you so much. Yes, he has had a neuropsych evaluation done and just so we all know what we are dealing with, he has ADHD (which is managed very well with medicine) and a mild case of dyslexia. They actually call it stealth dyslexia because he has such a good memory that he’s able to memorize words and compensate for the dyslexia. For many years, I knew there was something amiss, but his teachers would brush it off. As he got older, and reading and writing requirements were more challenging, it was harder for him to hide it, which is why/how he was finally diagnosed in 6th grade. We will have a new neyropsych evaluation done next year as well in case he needs specific accommodations (he has none as of now). So while his LD are not preventing him from succeeding in school currently, it’s really important that he continues to get help as needed once he’s at BS so he doesn’t become frustrated and lose interest especially in a more academically challenging environment.

You make a great point about being able to check out more schools virtually this year without making a commitment to them. Which is really going to help because we have quite a list going now!! When I showed my husband the list of schools from this thread (several of which were crossed out because of inconvenience) he said, don’t worry about location. Let’s find the best school for him, and we can deal with logistics later.

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Let’s find the best school for him, and we can deal with logistics later.

I wish I had the ability to love something on this site! How lucky for your son that his parents feel this way!

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Agree with @gardenstategal on that!
Also just want to say @cityran that I know how tricky it is to be balancing DK1 newly at BS (with both the covid and normal ups and downs) with the research for DK2 future plans.

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@Calliemomofgirls and @cityran , I have thought of both of you and what you are balancing. It’d be so much easier if the first were further down the road in this journey in so many ways, from emotional to getting a little better hindsight and inside info. I always felt like the luckiest kids were the ones whose older sibs were in college in terms of their understanding of the process, vibes, etc.

I think you are both amazing!

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We are familiar with Tabor but only from an athlete perspective. I am just not sure what the standards are for admission, or the academic support is, for a kid who isn’t going to be a varsity all the time player.

I think the idea to find out about learning centers is an excellent one. I know Brooks has one - that might be a good fit. They have some amazing teachers but are definitely not as intense as some of the other MA schools (maybe too far away from your daughter?).

Taft, ehh, I am not sure that fits what you describe. I know both teachers and students and it was fairly intense.

Also, since this might not be our last pandemic, you might want to check out how schools are handling things. For example, Concord Academy, all virtual, that would kill me as a parent.

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Why not take a look at Loomis? I know several graduates who loved their experience at Loomis, and the current leadership (head of school and a few trustees) are well regarded by parents and students. They are also known for turning students into excellent writers. It is about 2 hours from your family members, so it’s not too hard to plan a weekend visit. Good luck.

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@cityran. I caught up on threads when the forum was read only. I’m only now able to respond.

@ChoatieMom is right. We started touring in the summers when both DS and DD were 6th-7th grade. Most schools will offer tours without interviews for younger kids. You’ll still have to fill out inquiry forms, etc. Most of the better known schools are very used to accommodating those interested early.

We gleaned a lot of information from those early tours and were able to knock some schools off the list of contention.