Unhappy at boarding school as a day student?

I was going to post this in the cafe, but there doesn’t seem to be much traction there.
I’m currently attending a school mentioned very often in these forums as a day student, and I’m currently a sophomore. To be honest, I’m not that happy with my experience here. Probably only around a quarter of them are day students and I feel like the school isn’t doing that much to integrate them in with the boarders.
Everyone is nice, but I don’t feel like I have many close friends to hang out with, and I feel like I’m missing out on an important aspect of life in the dorms. Many of the day students stay very late on campus but because I live further away from school than they do I usually leave before 8:30 every day.
I’m also finding it very difficult to balance my social life with my academic work. My parents are pushing me to get good grades, and i am as well, and as a result i normally spend all my free time on weekdays on campus doing work in the library and not really talking to other people. I’ve been doing this for so long that my conscience bothers me when i spend time doing other things when I could be doing work.
A lot of the other day students are friends with each other but I’m friends with mostly boarders and not many day students, and I rarely hang out with them except during meals because they don’t do work in the library. Honestly I don’t see a lot of the extremely social people getting really good grades and if they do they usually stay up very late finishing work.
My parents don’t really like driving me to school if i don’t have to go(they also sleep quite early) so I haven’t gone to a single social event this entire year. It’s a 20 minute drive to the school and I also feel bad making my parents drive me there. I usually go on Sundays just for clubs but that’s pretty much it.
I feel like things would be so much better if I was a boarder but my parents say that’s not possible because it would be too much of a burden on them(another sibling is in college) I won’t be able to drive until I’m a senior.
I’m sorry if this post was ranty but I’ve been feeling like I don’t really belong on campus and I really don’t know how I can make it better without sacrificing my grades. I haven’t told my parents because I don’t want to worry them.

You sound like a great and hardworking kid. As a parent I am sorry that your experience so far isn’t what you hoped for socially. Given that you are already on campus what I estimate is about 70 percent of the waking hours time that other kids (boarders) are there, you may want to think about how you can make the best use of that time to improve your social life. If the conversation you are having with yourself is “if I socialize I will not excel in school,” try to balance that with realizing that if you are not happy that is also likely to decrease your success - both in grades and in life. The good news is that you have a lot of time to turn this situation around, starting with baby steps, whether or not you end up as a boarder. Best wishes.

It is called a “boarding” school. Why are you surprised that the dynamics aren’t geared towards day students?

That’s rather harsh. OP is only wishing the school to do more for day students, and not shift the gear toward to day students. I think it is a reasonable wish since the “boarding” school also accepts day students. I bet the school will say it is a day and boarding school, even though some of us will call it a boarding school.

For OP, seems like you have to spend more time outside of school than some other day students. Would it be possible to use this outside of school time for more work so it will free up more time for social while you are in school?

Most boarding schools that admit day students try to find a way to keep their community cohesive whether it’s assigning them to a residential “house”, giving them their own space on campus, or whatever. Often this works, but when it doesn’t, I suspect that the person – in this case, the OP – feels even more alienated.

Here are a couple of things that you might try:

Talk to your advisor and find out what’s involved in changing your status to boarding. Specifically, given your family’s situation, find out if it might quality you for financial aid. Odds are against this working, but if you’ve distinguished yourself as a student and are truly unhappy, it doesn’t hurt to ask. In fact, you should talk to your advisor about this situation in any case; he/she might have some ideas and might be able to help you find some strategies for getting out of the library and socializing.

Are you allowed to stay over in the dorms (even once a week) with a friend? My son did this a fair bit his first two years, especially if something social was going on in the evening. Or do you have a day student friend who would have you sleep over from time to time? Or that you could host from time to time so that your parents and his could share driving duties?

Try to get involved in a couple of things that might offer a chance to do non-academic things with friends. Is there a group that does service work somewhere? Are there activities that involve traveling off campus with a group (over a long weekend.)

If there’s a place where students hang out when they’re not studying, why not schedule yourself to spend an hour there a day? Maybe playing some Ping-Pong or pool (or whatever is there) or just hanging would give you a little more social time. If you’re going home at night and can study in the evening, you may be able to give up a little time in the library.

PLEASE talk to your parents about this. I know you don’t want to worry them, but they may be able to help you with a solution as well. They might be willing to give you an extra lift 2 or 3 times a month on the weekend, or they may be willing to explore car-pooling, or whatever. I offer this as a parent whose child brought the same concerns to us a sophomore. He had a classmate who stayed in the library and didn’t make friends and ultimately left the school.

Lastly, I would strongly suggest that you think about the conflict you feel when you’re socializing and not studying. If you’re doing well academically, this really isn’t healthy. It is, btw, not an unusual tension at top boarding schools – I have personally known kids who have had to leave because it caused them such enormous stress that they literally broke down. If there’s a counselor at your school, try to talk to them. Trust me, they’ve seen it before.

@paubsam, I wanted to add one more thing because I’ve been thinking about you since I posted. You are a very together person to have recognized your situation and been able to articulate it so well. As someone who has logged in at least 3 times the years that you have, I know how easy it is to just keep doing something until the rut is so deep that an exit seems impossible. Kudos for being tuned into your feelings and understanding the dynamics of your situation; that’s pretty awesome in and of itself and speaks well to your maturity. I’m pulling for you!

Thanks for the responses, everyone. They’ve been really helpful and I appreciate them very much.

My school has been putting ideas out about more day student inclusion on campus; I’m hoping that some of them will be implemented in the near future.
I’m going to try to spend a little more time socializing on campus when I can fit in some time, and possibly talk to some people I’m close to about these issues.

@gardenstategal thank you so much, i’m really grateful for your words.

I’ve got another idea. Why don’t you invite one of the boarders to your home for the weekend? Sometimes boarding schools allow the international boarders to do this for a weekend so they can get a sense of what its like in an American household.

A good time to do this is during spring break or a long weekend.

I’m a mom but I feel for you. Would you want to be a boarder if given the chance (I know some schools do not allow it within a certain mile radius)? If so, maybe you might talk to your advisor and the school’s counseling and they could talk to the someone on your behalf to make it happen.

My DD, who is a day student, spent this long weekend at a boarder’s home. Her split of friends is about 65 day/35 boarders. The school split is 25 day/75 boarders and it is building a new Student Center which will better include the day students by making their lounge right in the middle of it. This school is really into community and loves when day parents attend sports events to cheer teams on!

Here is her routine: She stays on campus every night until about 8:30 in the winter and about 9pm in better weather and daylight savings. Fridays are late nights, about 10:30pm, when she catches a play/talk/improv etc. with friends or does a club activity. She also heads back for Saturday morning practice and stays doing homework in the Day Student Lounge for a few hours, usually until after dinner. She tells me that it gives her a nice combo of work/socializing time. Most Sundays are spent at home with us.

She has also taken up the practice of Skyping friends, both day and boarders, for HOURS on Saturday afternoons and Sundays that she is not on campus. She would love to become a boarder but our finances do not allow for that and she unhappily understands. Hope this helps and good luck.

There are distinct upsides to being a day student that you may not realize until you board and vice versa. We considered both options and day offers a great many benefits for certain students. I wonder if you could arrange to spend a weekend night once a week , Friday or Saturday , as then you might feel that unique vibe that is boarding school apart from academics. You also might be able to see what you gain by being at home.

Boarding v day is always a tough call. Some boarding schools are great for day students, some are awful. The biggest problem comes when a prospective day student doesn’t have a good feel for the day student experience at the school before they apply.

One thing I have found is that day students are often happier when the admission pattern is a pack of kids from the local schools, meaning you have at least a few friendly or at least recognizable faces from your middle school and a good chance of a kid or two you’ve gone to school with since elementary school.

No easy answers for the OP, unfortunately. Athletic teams and music are a way to wedge yourself into the life of the school…