Affording Boarding Schools
Prep School Admission & Financial Aid Decisions Arrive in the Next Few Days
In prep school admission and financial aid, it’s good to be ready for anything.
With first round admission and financial aid letters due to arrive to families in the next few days, it’s time think about perspectives, plans, and responses depending on the offers you receive from schools.
It’s always best to have one’s ducks in a [...]
Private School A Special Opportunity- Not A Signifier of Social Status
Peter Baron of AdmissionsQuest forwarded an e-mail to me today from a woman wondering how open her children should be with their peers about their prep school applications and asking whether I thought the parents academic credentials carried any weight in the admissions process.
The question of how open to be is a sensitive one.
Some children [...]
St. Andrew’s-Sewanee Announces Scholarships for Leadership, Academics & Service
St. Andrews-Sewanee School (Sewanee, TN) offers a great opportunity for highly qualified students considering a boarding school education.
Under the Claiborne Scholars program, St. Andrews-Sewanee has available merit scholarships (1/2-1/4 tuition) available to new boarding 9th & 10th grade students.
Qualifying students are chosen on the basis of “a strong academic record and exhibit leadership qualities that [...]
American Hebrew Academy Works to Defray Campus Visit/Interview Costs
The campus visit with its requisite school tour and interview- a boarding school a tradition and right of passage- have, like so much, come under economic and social pressure as families push against busy home, school and work schedules as well as financing a single purpose trip to visit a prospective school.
Affording such a trip- [...]
The Current State of Private School Financial Aid from the Research Triangle
In a “Record numbers seek financial aid from private schools,” WRAL contributor Jane Paige touches on FA themes that we’ve been reading about and covering over the past year and a half. FA applications are up; school resources are stretched.
Paige does two things that make the article worthy of a quick read. [...]
Family Sacrifice Helps Connecticut Private Schools Weather Recession
The Hartford Courant ran a piece last Thursday (Connecticut’s Private Schools Have Suffered Only A Glancing Blow From Recession) covering the relief that Connecticut schools are finding in many a family’s commitment to their best education options. Yes, enrollment is down a bit. Yes, financial aid requests are up. But, in the [...]
Read MoreFamilies Find Benefits in Boarding Locally
Michael Birnbaum of the Washington Post published a piece last Tuesday on Washington, DC families uncovering the benefits boarding school close to home, “The Locals Live and Learn: Private School Families Say Boarding Makes Sense in Washington Region.” Such arrangements provide the independence and benefits boarding life for students and the opportunity to [...]
Read MoreBridgton Academy Offers Year-Round Lacrosse for Post Graduate Boys
Through its year-round lacrosse program, Bridgton Academy (Bridgton, ME)- a post graduate student only boys boarding school- offers a great opportunity for focused lacrosse players working toward high-level collegiate competition.
Students in the program work and grow through Bridgton’s college preparation academics along with fall and spring lacrosse seasons. The Wolverine lacrosse team plays nine [...]
How is the Recession Affecting Family Decisions in Independent Schools?
From the perspective of educational advisors, the silver lining to this recession is that client families are making decisions regarding independent schools more thoughtfully than ever. Most parents who during prosperous times were committed to sending their children to independent schools remain convinced that the education offered by independent schools – day and boarding – [...]
Read MoreChatham Hall Receives Largest Girls’ School Gift Ever
Chatham Hall announced today that the school received a $31 million gift from the estate of alumna Elizabeth Beckwith Nilsen ‘31 (The Nilsen Gift: Chatham Hall Receives Largest Gift in History of Girls’ Schools). Ms. Nilsen directed the funds be made part unrestricted endowment.
Dora Thomas, Chair of the Chatham Hall Board of Trustees expressed her [...]
Boone Pickens Brings Boarding School to Students in Need
Boone Pickens is doing what I’d do if I had either a pile of money and/or a magic wand- providing the foundation and support to bring the benefits and opportunities of boarding school beyond those who can pay the tuition.
Pickens donated $2.5 million for the T. Boone Pickens Training Center at Happy Hill Farm Academy. [...]
Tuition Insurance
Tuition insurance is a product that I had put out-of-sight/out-of-mind over the years. But the New York Times ran a brief conversation (What You Need to Know About Tuition Insurance) with “Mark Kantrowitz, an expert on student loans who publishes the Web site Finaid.org” (NYT) that merits mention.
While most of the conversation covers college tuition [...]
Reclaiming Boarding School Roots: Communal Responsibility and Frugality
Reading Tamar Lewin’s “For Colleges, Small Cuts Add Up to Big Savings” in the New York Times, I’m struck by how many potential areas of cost savings used to be part of boarding school communities and how easily boarding schools can reassert them by making them a priority- by setting aside time for them. Make [...]
Read MoreIn Any Market, the Down Portion of the Cycle Offers Buying Opportunities: Private Schools Are No Different- Carpe Diem
In a piece for SmartMoney (The Private School Pinch), Neil Parmer makes the case for the current private school admission cycle as a buyers opportunity. He doesn’t sugar coat the costs but he makes the case for- and provides ideas and examples- of the negotiating and buying opportunities available to parents.
Boarding and private schools [...]
Parents and Schools Working to Maintain Private School Opportunities
Diana Costello has written a snapshot of the school and family sides of the private school admission process in the lower Hudson River Valley for the Journal News and LoHud.com (“Parents still paying up for private schools“).
She chronicles the thinking and decisions of families as administrators work to keep their schools full and parents [...]
