Cost is similar to IMG Academy (generally $75Kish tuition, $20K-$30K room and board.) Seems like that is their goal…become an east coast version of IMG.
I doubt they have much financial aid to offer, but that’s not the point. Plenty of people will be willing to be full pay, just like at IMG. I would expect plenty of international interest too, last I saw about a third of IMG’s students were international.
It was brilliant of them to partner with Newman School, so that their classes had NCAA approval immediately. This NCAA approval can typically take a while, and is crucial as the students can’t waste time taking non-approved NCAA classes, if playing in college is their goal.
Does the relationship with Newman mean that the MAI students need to take the same courses as Newman students (IB courses)? Or would they be able to take a separate track of courses?
I don’t think they publish that, but my sense is not much financial aid at all. That’s not how private equity firms tend to roll! (An Asian PE firm owns IMG) I have known several people who went to IMG and they were all full pay.
I don’t really know. MAI and Newman school aren’t physically close to each other. To me, it seems the relationship was just one of MAI being instantly accredited and having NCAA approval for the classes they offer (and I assume Newman school gets $$.) If you look at the MAI academics page, it does not look like they will be offering IB courses.
This is a great point that had yet to be pointed out, and ultimately, an underlying issue in their business plan of action. I keep seeing people referencing IMG Academy in the comments. The reason they’re doing so, is because part of the marketing strategy of Masters Academy has been to hammer home that comparison in every single one of these paid newspaper and online journal article ads that they run. Here’s where the plan falls short…..
They are absolutely NOTHING like IMG Academy. Look up the photos of the new Masters Academy campus that they claim is costing $80 Mil to develop, and then google IMG Academy’s campus. The two could not possibly look any more foreign to one another. The only correlation between the two, is that Masters Academy brought in Rich Odell to be their Head of School - and he used to work at IMG Academy. That’s it. They have nothing else in common.
The guys (Masters brothers) who own and pioneered this venture are hockey guys. Hockey guys and the hockey industry as a whole, is widely known for playing fast and loose with the truth. Which perfectly illustrates their self-proclaimed association with IMG Academy. They figure if they say that enough times, people will start to subconsciously believe that it’s true. Where, in reality, they have yet to prove that they are anything within the same stratosphere as IMG Academy. They are charging more than local New England preparatory schools with centuries worth of prestige and merit. They are hiring average, run of the mill high school age coaches and recruiters. And ultimately, they have demonstrated absolutely nothing thus far to warrant any sort of perceived stature whatsoever.
My kids play hockey. I can’t really speak to where things are at with regard to timelines and whatnot with the other sports, but in the hockey world, this project has been talked about for years now. Initially, it was supposed to open last fall for this current school year. Then it was pushed back. To my knowledge, I have not yet heard of a single hockey player / family that has committed to Masters Academy for the Fall of 2026. They have a bunch of hockey staff listed, I’m not sure if the plan is to go into this spring/summer with naked rosters and the goal of building teams full of players who do not yet have their 2026-27 school plans in place, but one thing I can tell you from experience is that in the hockey world - first impressions are everything. In my opinion, if they were smart, they would push the hockey program back to 2027-28 even if the school is set to open in the Fall of 2026, and spend the entire year with a fully paid staff doing nothing but recruiting high level players. Because if they plan on rolling out just mediocre teams their first year, taking whoever they can get, the hockey world will quickly write them off and discard them as ‘just another money grab’ - which is a reputation that is nearly impossible to rebound back from (look at Lovell Academy).
It’ll be interesting to see how it shakes out, but at this point, I’d be lying if I said I had high hopes…
My kid is in his last year of U18/High School Hockey in Mass and your post nails it. Hockey is one of the most affluent sports due to the cost to achieve elite level results. Consequently, it is not a coincidence that there are a multitude of cottage industries that have popped up in this sport to take advantage of both the money and the delusion that youth hockey parents have. Im sure you’ll agree no one is more delusional than hockey parents. From advisors, to club teams, to academies, to now prep coaches, these people have taken more money from dumb and gullible parents than I have seen in nearly any other sport. This is no different and is already doomed to be at best just another Lovell Academy or NH Mountain Kings. Mid programs for mid players (except for girls hockey, Lovell has great success at the girls level) Programs that now promote ACHA club hockey as college hockey placements.
The hockey market is saturated in New England and that is the only sport this academy can really compete on as there just isnt enough talent in the other sports to draw from in New England (lower level football, basketball, etc.) so they have to recruit nationally and that just isn’t going to happen in the other sports in my opinion.
I keep getting ads on my social media about figure skating coaches being hired and Master’s, which is another segment they seem to be really targeting. I am a quasi-dedicated skating fan, so I assume that is why I get these ads (and prep school parent/alum).
I would think relative proximity to the skating club of Boston and the Simsbury CT club (?) where lots of top skaters (used to? still?) train, is interesting mix here. I feel like I don’t usually hear about skaters at boarding schools, but rather families moving or kids moving and maybe living with families to be near big training facilities? But definitely don’t have skating kids, so no clue. Lots of ice time (but competing with hockey?!) is probably attractive.
If is very close to the New England Sports Center which used to house an online school/hockey program that doesn’t seem to exist anymore. Perhaps they will be using this facility, as the 10 rinks are probably underutilized on weekdays.
Yes. About that far. There are other facilities nearby as well, but all are just one rink.
I’m wondering how well they can do with baseball. It’s always a challenge to get onto any fields around here before April. There is a large turf complex not too far away, and they are planning two turf fields, but for the most part, it’s just too cold and wet to play before April. They state a 50+ game schedule, but I don’t see how that is possible unless they require a summer term. Or is that 50 games over 4 teams like IMG has multiple teams? The coaches are all New England guys, but NE just isn’t known for its baseball programs (simply due to how short our season is). It would almost make sense to bring in someone from the SE or CA if they plan on courting any players from outside the region.
It will be hard for them to compete with IMG simply due to how many games they can play during the school year. Same with golf and possibly LAX.
There are good hockey teams in the area (Jr. Bruins, Eagles, Terriers), but they lack a formal boarding program for older kids. I wonder how Masters will fit in with this.
It seems like some of their sports already have staff and a vision, while others aren’t quite there yet.
This place is very close (within 10 minutes) to my house, so it will be very interesting to see their facilities once they are done. There really isn’t anything in the area that students can walk to and there is no town in Stowe. My town borders Stow and we have a cute downtown (Best Main Street in America, but really it’s not all that exciting. Especially for a high school kid). We are within 30-40 minutes of Middlesex, Concord Academy, Groton, St. Marks, Lawrence Academy and within 40-45 of all the Boston Area Schools and within 2 hours of at least 20 known boarding schools or sports powerhouses, so I’m assuming they are depending on those schools to fill their schedules.
For many sports (like baseball), IMG has multiple teams (I think it’s 8 for baseball). If you’re kid isn’t on the top 2 teams, they are probably not going to the MLB draft or a high D1 school. The kids on the lower team are full pay allowing them to bring in lots of seniors and PGs on scholarship who already have a lot of options. They go to IMG for a year to get bigger and stronger (and maybe boost their grades and SATS) and play on their tops teams. They then sell their “college placement” like those kids were developed for 4 years at IMG.
There are kids at IMG that wouldn’t start on their high school’s varsity team. If you sign the check your kid gets on a team.
They all sincerely believe they will play in college. And they will get onto a team (playing time is another thing). But in all probability it will be on a D3 team that you probably could have gotten onto without going to IMG. They place a lot of kids on D2 teams so they can say they are playing (not D3), however, most D2 is no better than D3. The lower level of D3 is becoming pay to play, so there is a team for anyone if you want to make athletics the driving force of your college search. They also place kids on JUCO teams.
It might be because they are limited by the conference/schedule of their current schools. Or perhaps they think they can build a better team from kids that can’t necessarily get into their current schools academically. If their model is the same as IMG, it also means they will get their athletes for 1/2 a day, every day and they won’t be required to play other sports out of season.
See above about using full pay students to fund the PGs that generate a lot of publicity.
Know an athlete being recruited; I’m a youth rec coach (not at the high school level) and hadn’t heard many specifics on the school, and google brought me here as there isn’t much other info. This kid’s recruitment came about from the kid initially looking at the school where the coach is coming from; interesting marketing strategy.
Good questions being raised. Figure skating and fencing seem like they could fit a niche need and this seems a viable option other than home schooling or online school for those athletes. Other sports may need a longer runway to gain critical mass, especially as the academics are unknown, especially when compared to other boarding schools in the region.
IMG offers money to the top athletes but has multiple teams for any sport so the bulk of the enrollment effectively underwrite the marquee teams. Doesn’t seem Masters will have the numbers at least initially to field more than one team per sport to do that, and how will financial aid work without an endowment?
My wife would have me committed if I proposed spending $80K to send a kid to school for esports.
I actually see this a bit differently. There are many D3 schools where the student athletes are literally keeping the lights on. This tends to be the schools that are struggling with enrollment and/or aren’t ranked as highly. Because of that, all of their students, athletes and non-athletes alike are receiving hefty discounts on COA. There are plenty of students who want to play college sports who will go to these schools.
IMO it’s the elite D3 schools that are pay to play for athletes (the Ivies to some degree as well). IME, many coaches ask recruits if they are applying for financial aid, and it is a clear advantage if a potential recruit is not applying for financial aid. I’ve never directly asked a coach if they have an edict from admissions to prefer full pays, but I wouldn’t be surprised if that were the case. And these schools, which tend to be need-blind in admissions, aren’t need blind for the recruited athletes…which can be 25%-33% of a given class. This is where the real pay to play is happening.
I am also watching what happens with MAI, simply because IMG is all kinds of messed up (it is not what it used to be, and I’m not even talking about the recent counternarcotics violations/settlement). There is clearly a market for this type of institution at $100K per year for many of the students.