<p>Wow…imagine my surprise to find myself caught up in this mess when I checked my notifications. A big thanks to everyone who has posted! I’m still not too sure about Hill, but I am sure that if everyone at L’ville is like the charming student MBVLoveless, then I will definitely be avoiding that particular school. </p>
<p>Hill is good.</p>
<p>Keep in mind that your impression of a school may change VERY much after a visit. We were so turned off when we visited S2’s top ranked school last Oct, that he didn’t even bother to apply. And then another lower preference school rose into his top 3. </p>
<p>Do NOT underestimate the difficulty of getting admitted into any of the top schools, Hill included. If you are touring schools in the Mid-Atlantic region, Hill is definitely worth visiting. </p>
<p>I applaud you for starting your school search early, but also caution you against making too narrow a list of prospective schools this early stage. We also started looking at schools for S2 around March of last year, and on his final list of 5 schools, only 2 schools remained from the original long list. And one of the two was a default because S1 goes there.</p>
<p>Make sure to follow this forum on 10-March, and you will appreciate how terribly, terribly competitive admissions is.</p>
<p>“I’m still not too sure about Hill”
Everyone’s confirmed it’s a "good’ private school. You won’t have a terrible education there by any means. If you’re still not too sure, I’m guessing, based on your other thread, that you might be looking for other factors as well than simply a “good” education. They more nurturing than competitive, but that comes at the cost of not attracting the best of the best. Refer to Benley’s post:</p>
<p>"Locally, Hill is considered <em>one of the good</em> private schools, and it’s not considered a better school than schools like Haverford, Episcopal Academy, Germantown Friends, etc. And partly because of its location, the day student area is relatively limited as well. For the same reasons, “one of the good private schools” is how the regional college AO’s consider the school as well. It’s right up there competing with the local private schools for college AO’s attention and doesn’t have much of an advantage.</p>
<p>So in summary, I think Hill is a very good school in terms of academics and probably boarding school experience, but you’d hold your breath for a little while before its names comes up as a top boarding schools in the country."</p>
<p>If name recognition is what you’re looking for, you will not be happy there, especially come the college process. If you don’t care and just want a good US boarding school experience, it’s more than a great place.</p>
<p>“but I am sure that if everyone at L’ville is like the charming student MBVLoveless, then I will definitely be avoiding that particular school”
You’d see a great sense of entitlement among the students at any of the top boarding schools/top colleges. It’s not just I and Lawreneville, and of course, not every student is like me.</p>
<p>Sorry, I have to weigh in again. This post is about Hill, but strikes the general themes many of us advocate for here on CC. I am no admissions officer, but am a reasonably close observer. I would have to assume that the top thirty to fifty BS, which are clustered on the East coast and scattered across the country from there, have plenty of “name recognition” among the experienced professionals at the top 200 or whatever colleges. They know about these schools well enough to read the application folder with discernment and acuity; the regional officer, indeed, is supposed to be knowledgeable about the BS that usually send applications. If you look at matriculation lists, as I did recently for Tabor, you see that the “spread” of acceptances is impressive, and the bottom half of a class can produce good results; the cc at most boarding schools are up to snuff in getting their name, data, and strengths out there. I’d say Hill’s list, at bottom, is a pretty good one, too. </p>
<p>“If name recognition is what you’re looking for, you will not be happy there, especially come the college process.”</p>
<p>Hill has been around for so long, has such a distinguished list of alumni, and today sends graduates to so many good colleges that no one should worry about the college process and a supposed lack of name recognition for Hill. Fewer students go to “elite” schools, by percentage or volume, than at Lawrenceville, and Hill may not be spoken of, today, in the same breath as HADES + L, but Hill could be a better school for YOU than that arch-rival. Being open-minded is a virtue in the app process; using “prestige” as your only limiting filter ultimately leads to a long-odds gamble.
<a href=“http://www.thehill.org/RelId/619730/ISvars/default/College_matriculation.htm[/url]”>http://www.thehill.org/RelId/619730/ISvars/default/College_matriculation.htm</a>
~O) </p>
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<p>^^As in, for example, Harry Elkins Widener. MBV: Ever heard of the Widener Library at Harvard University, the world’s largest university library? </p>
<p>Every prep school has a list of distinguished alumni; I dare say even L’ville has a few as well.</p>
<p>Anyway, MBVLoveless is just an L’ville student Hill-bashing in a more public extension of the Hill-L’ville rivalry. He/she is welcome to the folly – fact is, NONE of the the mid-Atlantic school get the name recognition of the NE schools and, better or worse, L’ville is a mid-Atlantic school. There is no better or worse name recognition or academic distinction between HIll and L’ville worthy of serious discussion other than by the MBV’s of this world who – like so many on CC in other but similar contexts – seek to comfort themselves with an exaggerated view of their own (self defined) comparative status and look for validation from the CC board. As MBV can readily see from the majority of responses posted here, he/she isn’t feeling much love on that score. </p>
<p>“There is no better or worse name recognition or academic distinction between HIll and L’ville worthy of serious discussion”</p>
<p>If you want to believe so, sure. Unfortunately, Hill will take quite some time to get to that level.</p>
<p>^^
If you want to believe so, sure</p>
<p>OMG I STAYED AT THE HILL SCHOOL FOR THE 2013 SUMMER 
I mean I’m not sure about the academics or anything i didnt “study” there it was a summer program but the campus and stuff is not bad. But the girls dorms only had like 2 showers 
Idk if u care but…most of the school is old of course because it was founded a long time ago so stuff needs to be redone but the fourth floor girls dorms was remade and it look AWESOME my friend lived there I was in the third floor and it was old so… There was no AC that was really annoying but the school year is in the winter/fall/ spring so I guess it’s fine. I really like the quad and sports were really fun cuz we had a lot of space, umm the food was really good…edible but don’t take my word for it cuz I’m a vegetarian hehe I really doubt I helped you but yeah sorry I didn’t go to school there or anything so I can’t tell y about the academics but overall living there was REALLY fun and the student center is cool </p>
<p>OP, you shouldn’t expect to “be sure about Hill” just from the discussion on cc among a group of people with vastly different experience, knowledge and values, but you have made the most out of it. Now you need to do your own research, obseving, thinking and making your own judgment. Good luck!</p>
<p>^^^^
Yes, I would say that about sums it up.</p>
<p>Unicorns are more common than A/C at many of the top BS.</p>
<p>I am only partially loath to resurrect a moribund thread, but I finally located my source for my comment which MVBLoveless disparaged back in early March. Leaning a bit on the latitude of the quoting policy for fair use on this site, I will now supply proof in support of my opinion, as originally quoted below.</p>
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</p>
<p>My source for my statement is the article “Some American Preparatory Schools” by Arthur Ruhl. In that article, Ruhl writes, " The Hill School, at Pottstown, Pennsylvania, and the Lawrenceville School, in the pleasant country near Princeton, differ from each other in many ways, and yet they may be grouped here as schools more exclusive than Andover or Exeter, and yet not quite as “tight” as the fashionable “church” schools of New England. Many others might be been picked out – Hotchkiss in Connecticut, Belmont in California, and so on – quite as well as these two."</p>
<p>MVB: I hope this will satisfy your need for a “source,” and must doubly satisfy you in that Lawrenceville is also included in the same breath!</p>
<p>DON’T GO TO HILL (also don’t look at my picture).</p>
<p>Bias aside, I have met a few Hill kids and they give their school a great representation. I certainly think that you couldn’t go wrong with Hill.</p>
<p>@MBVLoveless we gotta rescue this person</p>
<p>:) I love bashing Hill. (I’m not even at L’ville yet) But gotta start somewhere, right?</p>
<p>I really think Hill hit a bad spot name-wise. I mean, it’s called The Hill. Kind of boring. And second, it’s in a town called Pottstown. Just no. </p>
<p>No. </p>
<p>But that has nothing to do with the school, just my opinion. </p>
<p>+1 @stargirl3 !!</p>
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<p>So, I suspect that you would never go to “Brown”? Kind of boring – just a color, right?</p>
<p>Colors are fun. Hills aren’t. :)</p>
<p>@MBV & other arrogant Laurentians,</p>
<p>Learn to distinguish between a FRIENDLY ATHLETIC RIVALRY and being a jerk about other people’s major life decision.</p>
<p>Hill is a very distinguished school. And I dare say it has alumni more famous than Lville does.</p>