Comments on: Special Needs Boarding Schools

By: Jim

Jim — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 23:18:58 +0000

I have a 17 year old son that has non verbal learning disabilities, executive functioning weakness, ADD etc. Looking for a boarding school. He currently reads at about the 7th gade level, is in the 10th grade and is of average inteligence.
Please advise .

By: pharden

pharden — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 05:46:56 +0000

Does anyone know of a boarding school that’s easy to gain admission and is for kids who are very bright – no LD – but have crummy grades?

By: Tom O'Dell

Tom O'Dell — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 19:11:20 +0000

Bert and Linda,
I fully understand your frustration…..the search for the right school is a daunting task, especially if your child has some sort of special need. But the great thing about boarding schools is…there is a school for every kind of kid from the high achiever to the average kid to the student with special needs.
Linda, sounds to me like your son may have dyscalculia–a math disability. You may want to do a google search on this disability to learn more about it. While I don’t think there are any schools that are specifically for students with dyscalculia, you will find many of the LD boarding and day schools can deal with this. Oakwood has a learning center that can probably assist with his math problems but they won’t remediate it.
Bert, there are some junior boarding schools in eastern Mass that may be able to help you with your son’s issues…keep looking.

By: Tom O'Dell

Tom O'Dell — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 19:11:20 +0000

By: Linda

Linda — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 02:53:45 +0000

Bert, I wish I had an answer for you. I am struggling with the same problem with my son. I too am looking for a boarding school to match his needs and I am having a rather difficult time. My son is extremely bright in reading and vocabulary but his math is far below grade level. I am currently looking into Oakwood Friends Schoo in NY, but I am not sold yet. If you’ve discovered anything, please let me know.

By: Bert

Bert — Wed, 25 Jun 2008 08:01:26 +0000

I was wondering if someone could suggest a suitable high school (day or boarding) in or north of Boston that would work our son.
I don’t know if this falls in the special needs area, but our son, on one hand, scores at the “gifted” level on some tests (e.g. 700 on the SAT Critical Reading test he took one month after he turned twelve, over 150 on WISC IV Verbal), and on the other hand, he does not have perfect (all A’s) grades at his current school. This is mainly due to the fact that he is most definitely a spatial-visual learner as defined by Dr. Silverman here http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/Visual_Spatial_Learner/vsl.htm .
Just like the article says, he can sometime miss details, his hand-written output can be pretty bad (though he writes great essays if he is allowed to type them), and could improve his time management and organizational skills.
We are hoping to find a high school (he just finished the 7th grade) that could accomodate his learning style and still challenge him academically. We think it would also be good for him socially if he was in a school with a few other kids similar to him (i.e. nerdish, very smart, somewhat offbeat, not much into typical sports).