DS and I had campus tour and interview at Hotchkiss today. I was blown away by the beautiful view and state-of-art facilities and programs. I think I wowed a few times during the tour Then DS had quite long interview (30+ minutes) with one of the senior members of admissions. To me the duration of the interview was a good sign that their conversation went well. Then I got to talk to the interviewer. She first praised DS’ communication skills - how easy to carry on conversation with him. She questioned why DS is so advanced at math - is his current school pushing him to accelerate? I explained that it was not because of the school pushing him. He was so bored in math class last year, and the teacher even put in the school report complaining that DS was doodling in the class all the time. So this year, DS gets to skip one year of math. The interviewer seemed convinced and took notes. Then she asked DS’ birthday. From here the interview went downhill… DS is one of the youngest in his class because his birthday is in the middle of the year. He didn’t skip a grade nor attend school early. The interviewer said boarding students at Hotchkiss usually are older, so she doubt DS will be socially comfortable to hang out with kids 2 years older than him. I strongly doubt her claim. DS will already turn 14 before he enters 9th grade. Are average freshmen at Hotchkiss 16 years old??? Never heard students there are older than other boarding schools’. Then she suggested DS to apply for Groton in order to repeat 8th grade. I explained that DS is already advanced academically, and he is attending math class with high school seniors. And DS has attended various residential summer camps for 3 years. Then she took back her words, and suggested Deerfield and Choate instead…
I was so impressed by the gorgeous campus and various programs it offered, but when I heard interviewer suggesting other schools, my heart fell and sunk to the depth of the deepest ocean… I still cannot put myself together hours after. I don’t know what made the interviewer reject DS right in front of my face. She said DS was easy to talk to, and sounded mature in the conversation. Why did she believe being the younger ones in the class would deem DS unfit for the school???
On Hotchkiss website, it claims no discrimination based on age, race, etc. From my experience, it looks like if your kid has a late birthday, you should either repeat a year or try somewhere else.
As a HKiss student, I can confirm that this claim is inaccurate and that the average age is either 14 or 15. There are of course, students that are 13 and 16 but these are extremes and there are very few 16 year olds for that matter.
PLease, do not take this as a rejection of your child. Admissions officers interview a lot of kids, and they see a lot of applications. They usually know their stuff. There may have been another reason she suggested the other schools: she may see them as a better fit for your son. I feel your pain, because Hotchkiss was my kid’s dream school. She spent three summers there during middle school. And I, like you, felt my heart sink a little when an admissions officer said she hoped she would apply to other schools as well, and suggested another school in particular that she felt would be a very good fit for my kid. I was offended, but you know what? She was spot on. When we eventually visited the suggested school, my kid fell in love with it. It was/ is the perfect fit. She’s a senior now, with some good friends who attend Hotchkiss. And in hindsight, I can see that Hotchkiss wouldn’t have been the right fit for her at all.
FWIW, We actually considered 10 schools. And the interviews all were 30 to 45 minutes long.
There are MANY top-notch schools with gorgeous campuses and state of the art programs. There are also tons of highly qualified applicants. It would behoove you not to fall in love with any one school… Cast a wide net to avoid disappointment on March 10. Best of luck to you and your son with your application journey!
Easy to talk to isn’t necessarily the same thing as being socially mature. I don’t know that your son isn’t, of course, I don’t mean to suggest that. But the AO could have thought it was a great conversation with him while still not thinking that your son was a good fit for Hotchkiss at the moment. But @Torn2020 is right, it most certainly would not be the norm for 9th graders to be 16 years old. Mostly 14 and 15 year olds (many of the 15 year olds would be repeat 9th graders).
I doubt it is strictly an age thing. Some environments are better for kids whose intellectual/academic maturity and social maturity are more in synch. Kids who are several years ahead of their same-age peers academically, but socially or emotionaly slightly less mature might need a different environment to thrive – one where there are more kids like them. I was always academically advanced and my parents let me skip grades to keep me from getting bored. But the BEST thing they did for me was switch me to a different school and let me repeat a grade so I could be with kids closer to my age while not being completely academically bored.
This is a topic near & dear to my heart! As you can see from the other thread, a good number of boys do repeat when entering boarding school, and many have repeated when they were younger (in K maybe) so yes, there could a bunch of 16 year-old freshmen. The issue is not academic, it’s social. Hotchkiss wants to make sure that your son could contribute fully to the life of the school beyond the classroom. My suggestion would be to address this in the recommendations if possible. Maybe if his teachers and advisors speak to his maturity relative to his peers, that will allay Hotchkiss’ concerns. In addition, take @cameo43’s advice to heart and keep an open mind. Groton is very academic and may be a terrific fit. I wouldn’t send a “young” boy to Deerfield though, so it makes me think that this AO’s advice should be taken with a grain of salt
My daughter is a freshmen and she is still 13. She doesn’t experience problem with being younger. Majority of her friends are juniors too.
For girls, simply wearing mature style (not necessarily revealing) clothing can obscure age determination. I guess it would be different with boys as they are still physically growing and masculinity matters more among them.
@Hwacha1012 --If I would have known about this average age thing during DC #1’s admission cycle, I would have repeated him to become one of those 16 YO “Manly” freshmen that you are referencing
I think you are very lucky that the AO brought this up (and from our interview for our daughter last year, I am pretty sure I know who it is!). It IS funny that she mentioned Choate and Deerfield as schools that might be a “Better fit” for a younger-aged boy. DS was always the oldest in his public school classes, until we arrived at Choate-- where upon entering at 15 with a Summer birthday, he was right in the middle of the “Age Pack.”
FWIW, my traditional age DD is at Deerfield and she estimates that there are plenty of repeaters both boys and girls; however, there is a fair number of 14 year old of both genders too. I have a girl but I’m interested in the “young” boy reference to Deerfield. I don’t see that as an issue when I visit and there are plenty of young-looking boys there. Academically, I see Groton, Deerfield, and Hotchkiss in the same pool so the AO comment is interesting. DD was also choosing between Hotchkiss (not Groton as they don’t have her sport) and we may have spoken to the same AO. Happy to talk offline @Hwacha1012 .
Lots of younger academically advanced kids at Exeter if you haven’t considered it. Mine fit in fine socially, academically and in sports despite being “younger than their peers”.
Have you visited other schools yet? Did you have similar interactions?
Maybe it was just that particular interviewer, or maybe this was early on in interviews and boarding schools are quite impressive, so you reacted strongly to Hotchkiss, but you will also like other schools. Boarding schools generally have astonishing facilities and many are drool worthy so you may react similarly to all of them. There are many possibilities, but I think you are right to be concerned. I had similar interactions and felt like I was gently told by more than one school that my kid was not right for that school. One HADES AO said that my child could be “handled” but would be quite unusual. One department head at another school suggested there might be one or two other kids similar in the school which was not reassuring. While no one likes to hear what sound like rejections, I became convinced that these nice folks were trying to tell me something important and I listened. This allowed for far fewer applications and better focus on appropriate fit. I think AOs know a lot about fit.
How mature is your child? Do you think there are legitimate concerns about fit socially? Is it possible these concerns are more academic? Can Hotchkiss meet your son’s needs in math? We got a lot of pushback from schools that didn’t really offer what my child needed academically and they knew that and told us subtly to look elsewhere.
If you believe after visiting the schools on your son’s list that Hotchkiss is the place for him, then I’d work to assuage the concerns of the AO (with the kind of things you posted here – that he did well at camp for years, that he does well with older students in math class, etc.) However, I’d also entertain the idea another school might fit better and keep an open mind.
Lots of boys repeating 9th at boarding schools. We loved Hotchkiss too, but somehow they didn’t love our student, tho she get waitlisted. She had told them they were her first choice. You can’t change their (mis)perceptions, so just go with it. There are lots of great BS’s that have red brick, manicured lawns, and state of the art robotics. My two ended up at Choate and although DD loved HKiss, she also wound up loving Choate.
As I read this, my major reacton was that the AO was trying to tell you, clumsily, that your son is unlikely to be happy socially at Hotchkiss. It may not even be a maturity issue but one of having different interests/sensibilities than the boys who would be his peers.
I also suspect that the references to the other schools were less about the suitability of those schools (because the AO may not know them terrifically well in spite of his/her position – they aren’t his/her employer after all) and more that your son IS a good candidate for the rigors of a good prep school. One with a different culture.
It’s easy to feel like getting into a school is a kind of winning and being denied is s kind of losing. In reality, these schools really want to take kids that will thrive there and they are very good at identifying them. Colleges don’t care about this for the most part; they assume the kids know what’s best for them. Read these boards and you will see that’s often not so. High school age kids are far more fragile, and nobody wants to be responsible for the damage that can come from a bad (expensive ) match. Trust the process and make sure you are casting your net widely enough. Remember you have a great kid; you want him planted in the best spOT possible.
Hotchkiss and their approach to younger students is a bit bewildering to be honest with you. I know of two legacy kids who were on a bit on the young side (age 14 at entry). Both kids were soft-waitlisted. The admissions office at Hotchkiss called my friend and told him on M9 that the kid would be waitlisted, and pointed to the fact that the son was felt to be a bit on the young side. This happened twice within the same family, and it is no coincidence. The kids had no chance of getting off the waitlist.
I feared for this when my son interviewed 3 years ago. He was in the same situation, and even younger (he applied for entry as a new 9th grader at age 13). To worsen things, my son was physically small for his age. We met with one of the admissions officer who was also a football coach, and I could tell that he had some doubts about my son’s physical maturity. But in the end my son received an acceptance. A Hotchkiss coach from another sport intervened when he saw my son play at a tournament and really pushed for my son. If it weren’t for this coach, I’m fairly sure he would’ve been rejected based on the treatment we received during the interview.
I tend to agree with @gardenstategal. If the schools don’t want you, then don’t fight it. Its better that the kid go to a school where s/he will fit in.
I would suspect that when schools tell a legacy applicant that they’re waitlisted because of being on the young side, that’s just a face-saver. Easier to tell an alum that his or her kid wasn’t admitted for a reason that’s not a criticism of the kid, rather than saying that the school doesn’t think the kid could handle the academics, fit in socially, etc.
Then DS had quite long interview (30+ minutes) with one of the senior members of admissions. To me the duration of the interview was a good sign that their conversation went well. Then I got to talk to the interviewer. She first praised DS’ communication skills - how easy to carry on conversation with him. She questioned why DS is so advanced at math - is his current school pushing him to accelerate? I explained that it was not because of the school pushing him. He was so bored in math class last year, and the teacher even put in the school report complaining that DS was doodling in the class all the time. So this year, DS gets to skip one year of math. The interviewer seemed convinced and took notes. Then she asked DS’ birthday. From here the interview went downhill… DS is one of the youngest in his class because his birthday is in the middle of the year. He didn’t skip a grade nor attend school early. The interviewer said boarding students at Hotchkiss usually are older, so she doubt DS will be socially comfortable to hang out with kids 2 years older than him. I strongly doubt her claim. DS will already turn 14 before he enters 9th grade. Are average freshmen at Hotchkiss 16 years old??? Never heard students there are older than other boarding schools’. Then she suggested DS to apply for Groton in order to repeat 8th grade. I explained that DS is already advanced academically, and he is attending math class with high school seniors. And DS has attended various residential summer camps for 3 years. Then she took back her words, and suggested Deerfield and Choate instead…