Parenting
Ohio State’s Jim Tressel Would Make a Great Boarding School Teacher
In a quiet, but very public first (unconfirmed), Ohio State football coach Jim Tressel addresses- in a thoughtful, human, and understanding way- what is, essentially, the ‘third rail’ in college athletics- gay athletes.
I’ve seen Tressel’s interview with Outlook Columbus noted at Yahoo Sports and at ESPN.com.
Writing for Yahoo Sports, Dan Wetzel captures this issue [...]
National Association Director Marks onBoarding School’s 500th Post
Editor’s Note: For our 500th blog post, we invited friend and Independent Educational Consultants Association, Executive Director, Mark Sklarow to comment and reflect on onBoarding Schools’ contributions to families and the larger boarding school community.
Many thanks, Mark, for the kind words.
For those who live, eat and breathe boarding schools on a regular basis, [...]
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 [...]
Hyde School: Focus on Fundamentals
NBC Connecticut reporter Brad Drazen published a piece titled “A School to Shape Character as Well as Mind.”
While we’ve covered Hyde School quite a bit, one part of Drazens’ article stands out. It provides a succinct, presentation of Hyde’s fundamental belief and teaching that attitude, work ethic, and character provide the foundation from which [...]
Lasting Effects of Girls Athletics
Studies and evidence have a nasty habit of turning conventional wisdom into superstition.
It’s hell when we’ve always done it that way becomes- the wrong way. It’s great when the evidence comes in on your side.
Many boarding schools have required some level of student athletic participation for as long as most us can remember.
The majority [...]
A Vignette For Frustrated Parents
When I wore the dean of students hat at a boarding school in NH, I spent a good chunk of my time talking to parents about how their kids were doing and feeling.
From parents, the communication was often concern that their students weren’t listening, growing, and or assuming responsibilities as fast, or to as large an [...]
Steven Strogratz: “what math is all about and why it’s so enthralling to those who get it.”
Share this with math teachers.
“English In Real Life” was a fixture of my classroom. It wasn’t a set lesson. It was a few minutes at the opening of the period where students could share and show that they’d connected something that we’d covered in class to the larger world.
Their connections ranged from reading/finding [...]
J.D. Salinger Dies; musings on teaching The Catcher in the Rye
J.D. Salinger is of course noteworthy in this space because The Catcher in the Rye ranks as one of the great boarding school books of all time.
Salinger’s protagonist, Holden Caufield, presents a mid-twentieth century picture of teenage angst and cynicism.
Often taught as Holden losing innocence and becoming disillusioned, I find the book much more sad. [...]
MLK Day Musings
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction….The chain reaction of evil–hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars–must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the [...]
Read MoreInsight Into the Current State of Boarding and Private School Finances
Concord Monitor writer Karen Langley published a piece in last Sunday’s paper (Private Schools Weather Downturn: Many approaches taken to cut costs) covering the state of enrollment and finances of New Hampshire private schools.
She touches on the obvious- financial aid requests are up for all schools, endowment growth and income are down.
Of note, she adds [...]
MIT’s Women’s Technology Program: Summer Engineering Studies for High School Girls
It’s never too early to begin looking at summer opportunities and this is especially true if you’re a budding female scientist.
We recently read about MIT’s Women’s Technology Program – dedicated to helping girls explore engineering at the high school level.
The program works to “spark high school girls’ interest in the future study of engineering and [...]
South Kent School: Home For Deejay Brown
Good boarding schools excel at becoming home for students no matter the reason.
ESPN’s E:60 aired a story (E:60 Scared) about South Kent School student and basketball player Deejay Brown. The story hits on so much of what is good and right about boarding schools- structure, support, family.
As Deejay grows, works, and plays his way through [...]
Getting to Know Eagle Hill School
Dana Harbert, Admission Director, sat down with me for a Getting to Know interview to introduce the approaches that make Eagle Hill School unique in its role as a college preparatory boarding school for students with learning differences and ADD.
Highlights from our conversation include:
-Flexible academics and approaches to learning differences.
-Strong Arts program and culture.
-Dedicated teachers [...]
Cognitive Brain Research Beginning to Shape Teaching: Not the Holy Grail, But a Start
As imprecise people businesses, teaching and education research have resulted in some general approaches and directions over the years; but, with all the variables that students and teachers bring to learning, precision and prescription haven’t always been a tight fit.
Conventional wisdom and anecdotal experience have, for as long as I’ve been in the business, shaped [...]
Boarding School’s All-Inclusive Approach
Returning back from my travels across the country and now meeting prospective families during campus visits, I am truly amazed at how impressive this next generation of student really is.
We have some great future leaders amongst us. And, for many of the families I have met with over the last couple of months, the [...]
