<p>Looking at prep school sin the Boston area, basically down to:
Nobles
Rivers
Milton
Brooks
Middlesex
St Marks</p>
<p>My child attends a v competitive private school now and does well and is a good athlete, etc. Our current school has a big workload, like 2.5-3hrs per night. My child handles it fine most of the time, but I want my child to have a greater opportunity to enjoy some extra-curriculars and time in HS in general. Also leaning towards day student vs boarding.
Any thoughts?</p>
<p>I think it is unlikely that the workload will be any less at the schools you listed. Furthermore, as a day student, your child wouldn’t be able to start homework until returning home when the afternoon program is finished at 5:30. You may find less “down time” as a day student than as a boarder depending, of course on how far away the school is.</p>
<p>It is generally pretty hard to be a day student at a boarding school. Most kids I know do not come home until 7 or 8 pm each night. They do get some of the homework done at school, but not all. Then of course, if they are involved in any clubs or other activities that meet in the evening, many times they are not home until 9 or 10 pm.<br>
Some of the schools on your list have a lot of day students, so I’m sure it is easier there.
However, when you visit the schools, ask how the day students are made a part of the school, can they stay for meals without advance notice? When do clubs meet? When are teachers available for extra help? Do they have a dorm room available to them (NMH for example, assigns day students to a dorm room - about 8 or so per room and that is thier home base and they can stay over if they want). Other schools have a day student lounge (which in my opinion, simply seperates them even more).<br>
Also, if there are Saturday classes, keep that in mind for your transportation commitment.</p>
<p>I agree with the others, expect 2-3 hours of homework per night at any of the schools listed, maybe more. Although my S does not attend any of the schools you listed he did attend an ISL middle school and currently attends a local private day school. He gets home around 6 pm, showers and eats then does homework til about 9:30, sometimes later. There is little time for EC’s outside of school.</p>
<p>We were initally leaning towards Day Student as well, when the head of my son’s middle school gave us a lot of the info I posted. In addition, one big plus is that boarding school students don’t drive to and from school, but the day students will once they can (and boy do the parents celebrate then!).<br>
As the mom of a boy, and one who remembers what I did as a teenager driving, it’s nice to know he won’t be…at least while he’s AT school.</p>
<p>In any case, once we decided to consider boarding as an option, we approached the search as one to find the best school for him - day or boarding. That was really what he wanted too (and it was a great answer for him to give in interviews when they ask "why do you want to go to a boarding school?). We limited our search to within about 2 hours from home so that we could go to games and activities. He ended up only applying to one school as a day student (although there are about 4 that he could have applied to) but it wasn’t our first choice (he was waitlisted anyway due to the more intense competiton for day student spots).<br>
It sounds like you are keeping an open mind which is good.<br>
Good luck.</p>
<p>We are likely goign to a day school. The three “true” day schools are Rivers, Nobles and Milton, while Middlesex, St Marks, Brooks are more true boarding schools. Frankly, my child is up for boarding but as parents, we’re not! So, besides reputation, what are the differences betw those 3 day school options? I am more concerned about the right fit than a reputation- if my child is happy, the results will come.</p>
<p>You will know when you visit. Really. Everyone told us that and I thought “ya, sure” but when you walk onto campus, you just kind of KNOW if a school is right or not. Actually, there are 3 kinds of schools/visits.<br>
You can’t wait to start - in fact, you wish you could start right away
You could be very happy there
You can not wait for the visit to end, you can not get off campus fast enough.</p>
<p>We had all 3. We applied to the first 2 and happily he’s at one of the schools that fell into catagory 1 for all of us. </p>
<p>Since you have it narrowed down, set up visits and you’ll have a better idea.</p>
<p>Couple of points. First, I believe that Nobles has some kind of 5 day boarding option (although vast majority of kids are day). Milton has a sizeable boarding population and in recent years has been trying to expand it. Also, it is my understanding that it is more difficult to be accepted into Milton as a day student.</p>
<p>One thing you might want to think about in looking at schools like Brooks, Middlesex and St. Marks, which have a higher percentage of boarders, is to what extent your son will miss out on the social life of the school as a day student. It’s not so much of an issue where there is a large day student population (like at Milton), but if 85-90% of the students are boarders your son may feel like he’s missing things socially.</p>
<p>Finally, if you are interested in schools that have a mix of boarders and day students in the Boston area, you might take a look at Concord Academy, which has excellent academics, is very strong in the arts/theater, etc. and prides itself on being a very nurturing environment. The one thing it lacks, which may be important to you, is an ultra-competative athletics program.</p>
<p>I thought Concord would be the perfect school, but when we visited, we all got a bad vibe- too artsy / granola. I wouldn’t say we couldn’t wait to leave, but it didn’t feel like the place for us. Very disappointing result. Got a great vibe at Rivers, Nobles and they seem like v different schools from CA.</p>
<p>How about Nobles V Rivers? Nobles has a better rep for sure, but they seem v comparable and Rivers’ college placement may even be better than Nobles. Am I way off here?</p>
<p>Rivers has made a big effort in the last five years to upgrade their academics, and this has affected , naturally, college placements. That said, they are very different mind-sets. Rivers has a less competitive quality - which is good in some ways - students are much less stressed about where they go to college than at a traditional powerhouse like Nobles. Rivers is much smaller as well, and this gives it a very different feel.
One big factor is the sports one. Some schools have considerable sports requirements which can eat up a lot of free time.
Have you looked at BUA or Commonwealth? They are very competitive academically, but with a very different feel than most of the other preps.</p>
<p>Milton is a very, very demanding school academically. Doesn’t sound like what your son is looking for. My Milton-grad daughter has a higher GPA at a top uni than she had in high school.</p>
<p>+1 on BUA and Commonwealth, particularly Commonwealth which I know better. Academics are outstanding. Extraordinary teachers. Very small nurturing environment. Interesting, smart, but very quirky kids.</p>
<p>But I’m not sure they’re a good fit for original poster, whose son is very athletic. Neither school really emphasizes athletics and Commonwealth doesn’t exactly have state of the art athletic facilities. I think their most popular sport is fencing - which is hardly mainstream.</p>
<p>My child is v athletic, so Commonwealth and BUA don’t fit v well. Big racer of sailboats too and Milton has a sailing team which is a ++. It sounds like Milton / Nobles / Rivers all have some version of the same amount of work, but the difference may be in how competitive the environment feels?</p>
<p>Nobles and Milton both have excellent academic reputations and impressive college placement results, far beyond Rivers on both accounts. Some day schools have sports events on weekends.</p>
<p>St. Marks; I have to agree with you; a little musty, hints of noblesse oblige, claustrophobic feel. Loved the rampart lion, tho’.</p>
<p>Rivers is up and coming, but not there yet. During our tour of The Rivers School’s dreary, outdated campus, we were told by our guide that she was a sports recruit and wouldn’t have been admitted for her academics at all. Sure enough, the only other applicant in the waiting room was wearing their varsity jacket!</p>
<p>Too bad about Concord Academy; it’s such a personal choice! I love the campus and its location; walking distance to the commuter train to Boston, to “downtown” Concord, to the public library & of course, to Starbucks! </p>
<p>Brooks School is 30% day, with the day students appearing to be well integrated into the rest of the population. Has a strong commitment to sports, but I don’t know anything about their sailing. Brooks School sits on a lake, has two boathouses, for crew practice and sailing (club I think). Just opened a new fabulous science center, has a terrific library (better than my town’s) and a quite new (2-3 yrs old) athletic center with rowing tanks, hockey rink etc. </p>
<p>We also started out by looking at primarily day schools, then realized that we wanted to expand our search and re-think our day vs boarding dilemma(actually my kid decided). Then limited the search to schools that (among many other criteria) where no more than 1 1/2 hrs away. From the tour guide, the interviewer and most importantly, the other kids she spontaneously talked to in the dorms, my kid knew when she found the right school. See Linda’s post #1 “Can’t wait to start - in fact, wish you could start right away”!</p>
<p>Funny- we all liked Brooks a lot. Nice people, nice campus, nice approach. My child is very up for boarding school, but we parents are not- at all.</p>
<p>Hi Wallace, I’m really smiling as I’m reading this, well, with tears in my eyes. During one interview (can’t remember where) we were asked how we felt about our child boarding, whose idea was it etc., and I burst into tears! So, no, I was not up at all for boarding school. But here we are!</p>
<p>St. Mark’s is being changed a lot since the new school head took over two years ago. The main building is being renovated and academic program is being accelerated with additions of great facuties. The last two years college matriculation was improved quite a bit and the record is better or comparable to top five schools. St. Marks is a small school, they(students and faculties) are so closely connected to each other. Their sports are also very active.
Important thing is to balance between academic and sports.
I heard that faculty and staffs were not friendly. But It was before the new head came. The previous school head and his wife(associate head) were not effective at all. Now everything has been changed. They are so friendly and helpful. My daughter went there this year as a freshman. We are so glad that we chose St.Mark’s over other choices. At first, we chose St. Mark’s just because it is close to our home. But now, we are so happt to chose that school just because academic, sports, and faculties are so satisfactory.
Once the main building is renovated, it will look much better as well.</p>