<p>Not exactly related, but amusing:</p>
<p>A few years ago, a pipe in our house burst on a sub-freezing winter night. Called the plumber at 1 am on a weekend, he shows up quickly, does his job quickly, hands me a bill for $400 for lest than an hour’s work. I look at him in disbelief, saying “You charge more than my lawyer!” He says, with a smile, “Then next time your pipes burst at 1 am on a Saturday, call your lawyer” He had a point. I paid him.</p>
<p>I would say try calling a plumber for your legal problems. :D</p>
<p>IMO, there is little nurturing at top BSs, whether large or small. If you are a quiet kid, like my S, staying below the radar but doing well enough academically, he/she gets left alone. Attention goes to those who grab it or need it (because of academic or other issues). Slipping through the cracks, blending in with the background, absoluetely happens. These are high schools, not nursery school. If you have a quiet, blend in kid, no BS, no matter what the nurturing wrap is, will transform him/her.</p>
<p>I have one of those kids who is quite, reserved, and is not going to make a lot of waves, and would gladly blend into the background. Yet, there are people at her school who have taken an interest in her and who are aware of what she is doing and who encourage her to take risks. I appreciate the adults at her school who are pushing her to do more than just study, which she does a lot of everyday, and encourage her to have fun and enjoy her h.s. experience. It takes a certain level of awareness for them to know that she spends a lot of time in her room studying. I don’t feel like she has fallen through the cracks at all. Earlier this year I got an email about a change in her diet that an adult was concerned about. The adult noticed when she invited her to dinner. This may not be nurturing, but it tells me that they are concerned and paying attention to her. </p>
<p>I will never forget a conversation with my daughter a few months into her first year, I congratulated her for being willing to try new activities at school, all without Mama and Papa Bear pushing or suggesting. Her response, was yeah, but I have failed at everything I tried. That may have been technically true, but she had gained some invaluable experiences and lessons about persistence. Within a few months she had significant successes. If she had stayed home for school, I am convinced she would not have had the opportunties to try some of the things she has or the willingness to take some of the chances she has. She may not be transformed, but she is more confident, more comfortable with adults and peers and more willing to try something without the guarantee that she will succeed.</p>
<p>I’m a little bit different than grinzing in my view. At a good, smaller school you can and should expect that the faculty, dorm heads, adviser and head of school are aware of each student in an active and positive way. This makes all the difference to a kid who might otherwise slip quietly through four years of high school.</p>
<p>I have come to realize that when people complain that the school is not nurturing enough, they seem to be expecting the school to pay more individual attention and provide more customized support to help their kids stand out. In theory, each kid can stand out in their own way and to many families the final verdict on whether their kid stands out is the college admissions outcome. If this is true, then I don’t see this type of nuturing happening in any school. It is a fact that a healthy percentage of the students are “blending in with the background” in any school. To be fair, one can’t blame this all on the school. Some kids are just more motivated and more mature than others in high school.</p>
<p>People seem to be expressing more “concerns” about the bigger schools, namely Andover and Exeter, because 1)It is harder to stand out in such a big strong pool; 2) More students did stand out in middle school and expect to continue doing so in high school; and/or 3) Parents’ expectations are higher because their kids got into Big Two.</p>
<p>@emdee: I so appreciate you sharing your daughter’s ups and downs/experience. I think students and parents here at CC mostly paint a rosy picture of life at their particular BS (or their prospective student!..I’m definitely guilty of that one). And while I think the other side of the coin is also occasionally represented (witness the current “Exeter is 0% fun” thread) — the truth for the majority lies somewhere in between. Thanks again and enjoy spending time with your daughter over the Winter Break.</p>
<p>When I asked about the advisory system at one very small BS the AO pointed out that he can’t help but see his advisees around campus. The school is too small for anyone to hide. He coaches some of his advisees, some are in his classes, others babysit his kids. I think it would be hard not to form some sort of relationship under such circumstances.</p>
<p>^I still have trouble understanding the small=intimate theory. The biggest boarding school is merely 1000+ students, smaller than most smallest liberal arts colleges. More importantly, if the students/faculty ratio in bigger schools is not bigger than than that of smaller schools, couldn’t an advisor have the same number of advisees? If they meet as frequently, shouldn’t they potentially know their advisees just as well? Don’t the advisors in bigger schools teach, coach and live on campus as well? Aren’t the advisers possibly teaching, coaching or are dorm parents of their advisees just as in smaller schools? How can they hide in a class of 13 students? …</p>
<p>While I believe that the advisory systems in different schools, though they look and sound similar, can be implemented very differently, I don’t think size of the school is a critical factor in how successful they can be (Otherwise the top schools would all be smaller schools). It’s not how you call it, but how you do it.</p>
<p>Bigger schools are like factories. That’s why they have smoke stacks on their dining halls. :D</p>
<p>@DA: Do you think the average person living in Manhattan feels like his/her city is as intimate/welcoming/friendly/warm as someone from a small town feels about his/her town? Betting money is on “No”.</p>
<p>Can someone living in Manhattan live in one of the more “neighborhoody” areas and cultivate a social network of warm and welcoming friends/acquaintances? Of course. It just takes more work and a little more luck.</p>
<p>7D, that’s one point I’ve been trying to make. You really can’t compare Exeter vs. a smaller school with Manhattan vs. a small town (although Manhattan vs. a small town analogy is interesting). A school community of 1000+ students with that kind of faculty, facilitaties and supporting systems is a small community that is more than adequately equipped and potentially capable of being nurturing any way they want. It is a lot smaller than LACs like Amherst and Swarthmore, which people would raise as models of smaller LACs and assume they can provide adequate personal attention to kids who leave home the first time. Now, whether Exeter wants to or is designed to provide the kind of nurture some people would like to see is another issue, but to say that the size is the problem? I just don’t think that’s right. If nothing else, it’s too easy for the school to get away.</p>
<p>I get what you’re saying in relation to small LACs vs. “Big” BSs.</p>
<p>But I’d counter with the example of something like Penn (10,000+ undergrads) vs. Swarthmore (1,500 undergrads). Do you think West Philly and the trio of High Rise dorms compare favorably with the hamlet of Swarthmore and what I’m sure is a more bucolic campus, in terms of perceived warmth/intimacy? (Yes, I’ve intentionally left out the Quad and King’s Court/English House dorms out of this example to strengthen my argument ;-P…)</p>
<p>I’m just one Dad of one prospect, but I can safely say that in our extremely small not-quite-random sampling of NE and Mid-Atlantic BSs, only one of the larger schools felt remotely friendly to our family. And one of the biggest and most famous indeed felt the most factory-like. They certainly didn’t seem like that cared about feeling warm and friendly.</p>
<p>7D, this is not a competition of being the smallest. There is no such thing as the smaller the better. Within a certain parameter, size is not a negative factor any more especially considering its resources. I believe what you said about the factory like feeling about a certain school. I just want to point out that if it’s indeed a true reflection of the school then it’s the way the operate not the size of the school that should be responsible for it.</p>
<p>While the bantam weight boxer and the heavy weight boxer are equally talented, they provide different boxing experiences. If you’re a small guy, DAndrew, you’d prefer to box against the bantam weight. For you, smaller WOULD be better. These aren’t theoretical differences. They are physical.</p>
<p>A small school is going to be different from a large one in the same physical sense. One might argue that a bantam weight has faster hands just like one might argue that a small boarding school is more intimate, nurturing and aware of each child. The physical differences in the human body and school body are equally real and meaningful. This has nothing to do with qualitative differences. One is not better than the other, just different. </p>
<p>Sevendad is right.</p>
<p>Dandrew/Thacher–what exactly do you mean by nurturing and support if it is not individualized to your kid? Yes, at my S’s small school, faculty/advisor and head of school know his name–but that’s about it. No one is terribly involved in his development, and while development will happen despite that, I don’t attribute much to any active involvement or interest. I don’t see this as a big/small school thing, more of a function of our S being a blend in sort and not requiring or demanding more; hence, they leave him alone. Please give me hope that perhaps there are some very subtle ideas we could cling to . . .</p>
<p>Seven: I get that the schools feel different. But I agree with D’Andrew. Comparing Andover or Exeter vs. Groton or St. Marks to UPenn vs. Swarthmore just doesn’t work for me.</p>
<p>I went to a large college (10,000) undergrads. I never got to know faculty well enough to ask for a recommendation, took mostly large lectures, and only knew about 20 percent of my graduating class. I never once met with my assigned adviser; he only had office hours for one hour a week. I rarely had the same teacher twice or saw a faculty member again after I was in his/her class; most never got to know my name. There were 40 girls on my hall my freshman year, and 6 halls in the dorm. Sports were D1; other than intramurals and gym class, there were no chances for the average athlete to compete.</p>
<p>There’s no way for me to compare that experience to my son’s experience at Exeter. He sits in classes of 12; has an adviser (who is a faculty member and coach) on duty at least once a week in his dorm; lives in that dorm with several other faculty members and 30 other kids; has his coach from fall as his teacher this winter; and never walks to classes or meals without seeing and greeting students and faculty he knows well. If he wants to try a new sport or activity, he tries it. If I call his adviser and let him know my kid’s got a problem, the adviser is in his room that evening. </p>
<p>Can you add a third list here, giving some specific ways that schools of 200 and 1000 differ in terms of nurture? Beyond initial impressions, I mean, which clearly from the posts above are a 50/50 proposition (school is warm/school is cold), no matter what the school. </p>
<p>I can think of one thing: at a small school, the deans and headmasters are more likely to know most of the students, at least by name. What else?</p>
<p>FWIW, I think we all have a point/are “right” in our own way.</p>
<p>I mean, I totally buy DA’s point that “Just because a school is large doesn’t mean that it automatically provides a LESS nurturing environment and just because a school is small doesn’t mean that it automatically provides a MORE nurturing environment.” (I think that’s what he’s saying.) </p>
<p>But I also believe that, in general, larger environments (not just BSs) ARE inherently less personal (which is but one component in the notion of “nurturing”). Most of the kids in the church youth group I supervise tell me that they’d rather go to their small public HS (despite its many faults) than the neighboring large public HS because they feel their own is smaller and as a result, more friendly. And while we’re on the subject of church, would the average member of Joel Osteen’s mega-ministry feel like Joel would recognize them and call them by name — as is the case at the small/small-town church I attend?</p>
<p>Now, in contrast to classicalmama’s college experience, I also went to a large (10,000+ undergrad) university but did get to know several faculty members relatively well…in those subjects for which I had a passion/talent. I never needed to ask them for reccos because I went into an industry where that was not a factor. But I know I could have. Which is all just a way of saying (once again) that your mileage may vary.</p>
<p>@classicalmama: I’d have to think a bit to add to the “200 vs. 1000” list you’ve started. I’m tempted to start with “More individualized attention when it comes to academics/social issues.”…but I don’t think that is necessarily true/solely size-dependent.</p>
<p>(@DA: Now I feel like I’ve “spilt” too much digital ink defending/exploring a particular issue!?!)</p>
<p>^^This is what CC is here for. Use it or lose it!</p>
<p>Seven: I actually do agree with you that there are big differences between a community of 200 and a community of 1000, whether it’s a church or a school. </p>
<p>My kid went to Exeter from a junior high school/high school with an enrollment of just over 200, and there are big differences in terms of diversity of the student body, friendships and social groups, number and diversity of faculty, and curricular choices. </p>
<p>In general, I don’t see the nurture being different because I think that how nurtured a kid feels has more to do with faculty/student ratio, how dorms are set up, and the advising system in place at a school than it does with size. </p>
<p>However, one difference that might relate more to nurture than I had originally thought: At Exeter, students switch teachers each term in most classes; at his old school there are only one or two teachers in each discipline. The advantage of the Exeter system is a fresh start with a new teacher every ten weeks, and I like the exposure to lots of different teaching approaches/strengths. I can see how to another student, however, switching teachers might be a negative because there’s less time to build a student-teacher relationship. </p>
<p>At Exeter, those long-term relationships can be built with dorm faculty, coaches, arts faculty, and advisers, but I fondly remember a high school teacher I had for two years of French and one year of English, and that sort of relationship is less likely. On the other hand, I would have loved a one-term relationship with the math teacher I was stuck with for my last two high school math classes ;)</p>