<p>We are a family new to the boarding school admission process and reading this forum furiously to glean as much knowledge as possible. We are from an area where there really are no families with experience at prep schools. Nobody in our families ever attended boarding school. We are very grateful for all the information found on these pages. Thank you to everyone who has shared their story and given their time helping others.</p>
<p>One thing that stands out after reading about prep schools here is the advice to cast a wide net. As much as we'd like to, we are unable to travel to the East coast to visit schools at this time. Our dc is home schooled, high 90's SSAT scores, not a stellar athlete or musician, and needs substantial FA. This is our tentative school list at this time:</p>
<p>Andover
Choate
Concord
Deerfield
Episcopal
Exeter
George
Kent
Loomis
Mercersburg
Northfield Mount Hermon</p>
<p>We are hoping this list provides both a wide mix and good matches for DC. Wondering if y'all could weigh in with your insight. Does this list represent a wide enough net or are there schools that could be added or should be dropped? There are SO many schools to choose from and they all seem quite wonderful. </p>
<p>Any advice will be most appreciated. Thank you!</p>
<p>What is your child (I’m going to refer to him or her as “he”) interested in? What is he like? Schools have different reputations and personalities, and it’s important to find one that will suit him well. If your child is shy and not very social, he is probably best off applying to a more low-key school where he can shine. Some schools have a country-club atmosphere. Others are very liberal. There are all-girl and all-boy schools out there as well. If you could give more information about your family and your child, perhaps someone could recommend a school that would be a good fit.</p>
<p>Sorry, I should have provided a better picture of him. We are very concerned about finding the best fit. </p>
<p>He is very social, personable, and outgoing. He loves baseball and recently discovered a fondness for squash. He does well in all academic subjects and is liberal. He won’t consider an all-boys school. Model UN, Mock Trial, and newspaper have been some of his recent EC’s. He’d be great at Debate but hasn’t had the opportunity to participate yet. He is a youth board member of a local community service organization. He assimilates well and gets along with people of all ages and backgrounds. He has attended a summer session at Exeter, THINK Summer Institute, and is a SET member at Johns Hopkins. He is a voracious reader who plays the guitar and enjoys his PS3. Computer science is another newly discovered interest. </p>
<p>Slumper,
A FA administrator of a school we were interested in told me directly that it’s unlikely for a student to receive significant FA if they don’t visit the school in person. The reasoning was that if the family doesn’t put in the time/money/effort to see the school, the school isn’t likely to be willing to invest in them.</p>
<p>I asked if she thought this was a typical attitude of lots of schools, and she said yes.<br>
Obviously, this was only one administrator’s opinion. However, it seems feasible.</p>
<p>All of that to say, with your need for substantial FA, you might want to reconsider taking a trip, or at least call some of the schools you are interested in and speak directly to a FA person and ask them if not visiting will hurt your chances of getting FA. While some might not be forthcoming, you might find some who are.</p>
<p>Home schooling can be a great plus, or a minus, depending on how you pitch the experience and how your child interacts. Remember most of these schools are looking for kids with good odds for making the transition to largely independent living, so is your child ready to handle not only the academic rigor, but the rigor of the whole experience of flying the nest? I hope the answer is an easy "yes,’ but then I think you’ll want to consider how to demonstrate that in the app. Sounds like grades and test scores put him/her on the playing field, and while sports/music can help, they aren’t critical if your child shows engaging leadership ability, passion for an EC the school can help develop and supplement, or offers the <em>community</em> of the school an unusual added value. These are all things to think about in terms of the application essays, the parent statements, and even the interviews. And I think you might want to look for one or two more “safety” type schools, examining the hidden gems thread and other resources. The majority of your list is “uber-competitive.”</p>
<p>One option is to see if the school has a traveling Adcom. Many families who need substantial FA can’t afford to travel to boarding school and are not penalized for it. That’s why Adcoms have a travel schedule - so the travel burden for you is lower (i.e. you can drive three hours to one in Chicago, or (name the city).)</p>
<p>But realize - only a small percentage of students at boarding schools get financial aid (approx 30-35%) If you do the math, that’s not a lot of students. And of them, many are getting partial aid, not full aid. So if you need “substantial” aid - you’re risk is even higher unless your child offers something to the campus they can’t get another way. </p>
<p>BUT - how you are viewed depends on the family and their circumstances. If the issue is that the family needs FA and truly can’t afford to travel, versus has a financial circumstances that show they could have - with planning - done the trip and punted - that’s different.</p>
<p>Kids who make the effort to travel to the school do tend to stand out in a positive way - but do it with the knowledge that there are no guarantees and many students who do school visits also get rejection letters too. There just aren’t enough spots for every student who wants one - worse so if they fall into the FA category.</p>
<p>If he attended a summer session at Exeter - that may help because boarding schools know he understand what the lifestyle will be like on campus. But unless he got a scholarship and travel - one would think you can scrape up the money to visit the schools in NE (at least 4) over a long weekend using a combination of low cost airfare, low cost hotels and a cheap rental from Budget.</p>
<p>Travel to visit the schools at this time is troublesome for so many reasons (in no particular order):</p>
<ul>
<li>I am currently unemployed making travel funds extremely limited.</li>
<li>We are in the middle of the country so getting to either coast (or darn near anywhere) is difficult to do economically. Chicago is 6+ hours away by car and often has better fares. That may be a possibility.</li>
<li>Spouse works odd days/hours making after-school & weekend care for younger child less than optimal. (No family nearby to help with childcare.)
-The schools he is interested in are pretty scattered. Is it even possible to visit that many schools in one trip?
-We are so late to the game. He decided to apply fairly recently. Ugh.</li>
</ul>
<p>I do understand why the schools prefer families to visit in person. However, I did not consider how it might impact the FA decision. I realize the need for aid puts us in a very unpleasant place. Ugh.</p>
<p>He did attend the summer session(s) on scholarship. The home schooling aspect has not lessened this child’s ability to socialize or fly the coop in any way. He’s always been very independent. Thanks for the good tips on how to best show the home schooling experience in the “right” way.</p>
<p>We’ll take another hard look at trying to make visits a possibility.</p>
<p>Not sure if this is helpful but my family attended a school fair on the West Coast aimed at middle to lower income families. Several North East schools were there, including Exeter, Lawrenceville, Choate, Hotchkiss, Andover and Deerfield. I made a point in asking EVERY North East school we had a chance to meet with if NOT interviewing at the school would hinder chances of being accepted. They all said absolutely not, that they view Skype and Alumni interviews as valuable as in person interviews.
And again, this fair was reaching out to families that would need some to full FA.</p>
<p>We’re happy to Skype (but do feel it’d be best to visit the schools and interview in-person). And we do have offers from alumni from 2 of the schools on the list to do interviews locally. We don’t know yet if the schools will permit this or not (Deerfield and NMH).</p>
<p>We did try to find a school fair or local travel visits but didn’t find any in our area. There was one about 6+ hours away but it was earlier in the season and we didn’t know about it until after it had happened. </p>
<p>It’s very helpful to hear about the experiences others have had and the advice they were given. Thank you for sharing your tips. </p>
<p>We’ll keep squeezing the travel budget turnip and hope something comes out!</p>
<p>Another thing to consider is that interview spots can fill up, so at this point it may not be possible to schedule an in-person interview at all the schools on your list even if you could visit them. Schools can be more flexible with Skype interviews so I would definitely try to do that if you can’t visit and/or interview in person. Even if you can’t interview, a visit would still be valuable if you can swing it because you could probably still get a tour, you would get much better feel for the student body and the campus, etc.</p>
<p>It sounds as if your son would be a good match academically and socially with Concord. They have the sports and most of the ECs you mentioned, as well as a computer science program. Admissions are need blind and they meet full FA need. However, as with many schools, they have a FA budget and may not be able to offer FA to everyone who qualifies (you would either get the full FA or be put on a FA wait list). If you did a Skype interview instead of visiting, I don’t think that would disadvantage you for FA (though it’s worth calling and asking the FA director, he will be straightforward about it).</p>
<p>@photodad: Yes, we are thinking Concord would be a great fit for our son, too. It’s also at the top of his list. We’ll call the FA director. Thank you.</p>
<p>Yes, it is on the late side to be starting the admissions process, but it is definitely do-able as our family did not even start until AFTER Xmas, and DS took the Jan SSAT w 2 weeks’ notice.</p>
<p>As you are under the gun to accomplish a lot of tasks before the admissions deadline a month away, it would be good to step back a moment to assess how urgent it is for your S to enter b.s. in the next academic year. You did not mention what “grade” your homeschool S is presently in. Would applying in next year’s admissions cycle be a less stressful option logistically, financially, emotionally?</p>
<p>He has been mulling it over for a bit and researching schools since October. He decided at the end of November that he REALLY wants to apply for next year. </p>
<p>He is 14 and wants to enter 10th grade, however, he is open to considering entry as a repeat 9th grader. Since he has been mostly home schooled, we tend not to think in “ability” rather than “grade” terms. Sorry for omitting that bit of vital information.</p>
<p>Your advice is very wise and so appreciated. It also make the most sense, that’s for sure! </p>
<p>However, since there are no work or school time constraints, we think it MIGHT be possible to do this year. He has been desperate for a school that can meet his needs his whole life and is so ready to spread his wings and fly. He wants to study with intellectual peers and engaging teachers. At a school with the resources to support his academic needs. It does seem pretty nuts to take on such an endeavor at this time. Then again, deciding to home school seemed pretty impulsive at the time. </p>
<p>Again, thank you for your thoughtful comments. We will take them under serious consideration.</p>
<p>Andover-Concord is also doable, and looking back at your previous posts, your child already spent a summer at Exeter, so maybe they could just do a Skype interview? Southwest also flies into Bradley Airport (Hartford CT/Springfield MA) which is centrally located to a lot of these schools.</p>
<p>Somehow lost the whole post about how you should search this forum under “visit.” We have helped other families plan the “two a day” trip. Choate-Loomis, Choate-Deerfield, Loomis-Deerfield, Deerfield-NMH are all pretty doable in one day as they are on the I91 corridor. I have been to all of them for sports!</p>
<p>My DS printed out a google map of NE on the computer and then plotted all the schools he was interested in on the map. It was a good visual to figure out the best way to plan our visits. We did 2 on several days, generally 1-2 hour drive between. And 2 took all day as we alloted time to speak with coaches/special interest teachers at each school.</p>
<p>As the 9th grade “repeat” option is already on your radar, then you are probably mulling the feasibility of 10th grade "repeat’ next year.</p>
<p>Be aware that entering in 10th grade is very, very common. Many schools expand the class size from freshman to sophomore year by another 50%-100%, as many school systems in the U.S. have middle school thru 9th grade. </p>
<p>Good luck on your mission this year, should you choose to accept it</p>
<p>Knowing that you are in the Chicago area, have you looked at/visited Wayland Academy in Beaver Dam, WI? Don’t think they have squash, but a good all around co-ed school that I graduated from “back in the day”. Worth looking at to have a midwestern option.</p>
They are very strong in all of the above.</p>