I am fascinated by the educational choices of the upper class

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to Andover and my sister went to Horace Mann.

Assuming those schools qualify:

We had excellent instruction in writing in particular. The language offerings certainly were broader than in your typical high school. Andover offers courses in 8 languages; I took Latin and Ancient Greek.

I took several dedicated philosophy courses. My favorite was called Law and Morality, where we read Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Socrates, etc. My friend took a course exclusively on Camus.

The school has a celebrated American art gallery and an archaeology museum, so we were able to use those facilities to supplement courses. One of my friends had the opportunity to do an independent curation project at the archaeology museum.

This is in addition to broad offerings in math, science, art, etc.

If you have specific questions, I’m happy to try to answer them.

This is OP. Thank you! I suppose part of my fascination with the education of the elite is the head start they receive in terms of knowing certain things. It appears there is an emphasis on languages and culture. What are other aspects of their curriculum? What about athletics?

Andover’s Course of Study is here; it’ll be much more comprehensive than anything I post: https://www.andover.edu/files/CourseOfStudy.pdf

It’s basically like going to a liberal arts college without declaring a major. You end up graduating with a broad foundation in language, history, philosophy and religion, math, science, and the arts. College was very easy in comparison.

We were all required to participate in sports all 4 years. However, it only had to be a team sport the first year. After that, it just had to be some sort of physical activity. I signed up for squash my first year and was terrible at it, so I switched to yoga, which fulfilled the requirement. We also had to pass a swim test to graduate.

Andover has a huge athletics department, though. They have a hockey rink, multiple track facilities, an Olympic-sized swimming pool, etc. There was a girl in my year who swam for the US Olympic team.

My main extracurricular was orchestra. They have three chamber orchestras, which you have to audition for, and one larger symphony orchestra. That took up a lot of time.

I also did significant community service.

I didn't know I was so interested in Andover until I read this thread, ha! I have so many questions:

Did you enjoy going there? Would you send your own kids? Did your family pay full tuition? Are your classmates all super powerful and accomplished now?

I loved going there. I would send my daughter if she wanted to go, but I would never push her to do it because it’s such a huge decision to go away to boarding school.

My family was full pay.

My classmates vary in terms of what they’re doing, but several have best-selling books. Several are very well respected surgeons and public-facing medical professionals, if that makes sense. They’re nearly all doing interesting things, even if they aren’t well known.

Here’s a list of notable alums: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Phillips_Academy_alumni

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And they’re still not smart enough to just carry their own jar of Grey Poupon

One does tend to run out of it so quickly

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Oh and to answer your question about being out of reach:

We have zero family legacy at either school. These schools are absolutely accessible for smart, motivated kids.

Who have money...since you admitted to being full pay correct...so less than 2-5% of the entire US population and I am being generous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oh and to answer your question about being out of reach:

We have zero family legacy at either school. These schools are absolutely accessible for smart, motivated kids.

Who have money...since you admitted to being full pay correct...so less than 2-5% of the entire US population and I am being generous.

Andover is need blind. They fulfill 100% of demonstrated financial need and 50% of the kids are on FA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did going away to boarding school affect your relationship with your parents? (positively or negatively)? Do you feel like you are less close to them because they saw you less growing up?

I was really close to them then and still am. They visited me every other weekend.

I still see them all the time! They’re the best.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to Andover and my sister went to Horace Mann.

Assuming those schools qualify:

We had excellent instruction in writing in particular. The language offerings certainly were broader than in your typical high school. Andover offers courses in 8 languages; I took Latin and Ancient Greek.

I took several dedicated philosophy courses. My favorite was called Law and Morality, where we read Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Socrates, etc. My friend took a course exclusively on Camus.

The school has a celebrated American art gallery and an archaeology museum, so we were able to use those facilities to supplement courses. One of my friends had the opportunity to do an independent curation project at the archaeology museum.

This is in addition to broad offerings in math, science, art, etc.

If you have specific questions, I’m happy to try to answer them.

It’s the Latin and Greek.

FWIW, you can also get this for free at a classical public charter school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to Andover and my sister went to Horace Mann.

Assuming those schools qualify:

We had excellent instruction in writing in particular. The language offerings certainly were broader than in your typical high school. Andover offers courses in 8 languages; I took Latin and Ancient Greek.

I took several dedicated philosophy courses. My favorite was called Law and Morality, where we read Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Socrates, etc. My friend took a course exclusively on Camus.

The school has a celebrated American art gallery and an archaeology museum, so we were able to use those facilities to supplement courses. One of my friends had the opportunity to do an independent curation project at the archaeology museum.

This is in addition to broad offerings in math, science, art, etc.

If you have specific questions, I’m happy to try to answer them.

It’s the Latin and Greek.

FWIW, you can also get this for free at a classical public charter school.

But how many people are disciplined as Will Hunter?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to Andover and my sister went to Horace Mann.

Assuming those schools qualify:

We had excellent instruction in writing in particular. The language offerings certainly were broader than in your typical high school. Andover offers courses in 8 languages; I took Latin and Ancient Greek.

I took several dedicated philosophy courses. My favorite was called Law and Morality, where we read Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Socrates, etc. My friend took a course exclusively on Camus.

The school has a celebrated American art gallery and an archaeology museum, so we were able to use those facilities to supplement courses. One of my friends had the opportunity to do an independent curation project at the archaeology museum.

This is in addition to broad offerings in math, science, art, etc.

If you have specific questions, I’m happy to try to answer them.

It’s the Latin and Greek.

FWIW, you can also get this for free at a classical public charter school.

Ok. I don’t think anyone goes to Andover solely to take Latin and Greek.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to Andover and my sister went to Horace Mann.

Assuming those schools qualify:

We had excellent instruction in writing in particular. The language offerings certainly were broader than in your typical high school. Andover offers courses in 8 languages; I took Latin and Ancient Greek.

I took several dedicated philosophy courses. My favorite was called Law and Morality, where we read Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Socrates, etc. My friend took a course exclusively on Camus.

The school has a celebrated American art gallery and an archaeology museum, so we were able to use those facilities to supplement courses. One of my friends had the opportunity to do an independent curation project at the archaeology museum.

This is in addition to broad offerings in math, science, art, etc.

If you have specific questions, I’m happy to try to answer them.

This is OP. Thank you! I suppose part of my fascination with the education of the elite is the head start they receive in terms of knowing certain things. It appears there is an emphasis on languages and culture. What are other aspects of their curriculum? What about athletics?

Andover’s Course of Study is here; it’ll be much more comprehensive than anything I post: https://www.andover.edu/files/CourseOfStudy.pdf

It’s basically like going to a liberal arts college without declaring a major. You end up graduating with a broad foundation in language, history, philosophy and religion, math, science, and the arts. College was very easy in comparison.

We were all required to participate in sports all 4 years. However, it only had to be a team sport the first year. After that, it just had to be some sort of physical activity. I signed up for squash my first year and was terrible at it, so I switched to yoga, which fulfilled the requirement. We also had to pass a swim test to graduate.

Andover has a huge athletics department, though. They have a hockey rink, multiple track facilities, an Olympic-sized swimming pool, etc. There was a girl in my year who swam for the US Olympic team.

My main extracurricular was orchestra. They have three chamber orchestras, which you have to audition for, and one larger symphony orchestra. That took up a lot of time.

I also did significant community service.

My husband went to an all boys school and sports after school was mandatory. Every student played, not just a chosen few. Not every public school kid get to play sports with his classmates and that’s a major failing.

[Anonymous]

This has long interested me. OP, here are some books I found interesting:
Preparing For Power: America's Elite Boarding Schools
Prep by Curtis Sittenfd (and interviews with her)
The Best of the Best: Becoming Elite at an American Boarding School
Class, by Paul Fussell
On the British side the dynamics are different, but there is a LOT written on this subject.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to Andover and my sister went to Horace Mann.

Assuming those schools qualify:

We had excellent instruction in writing in particular. The language offerings certainly were broader than in your typical high school. Andover offers courses in 8 languages; I took Latin and Ancient Greek.

I took several dedicated philosophy courses. My favorite was called Law and Morality, where we read Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Socrates, etc. My friend took a course exclusively on Camus.

The school has a celebrated American art gallery and an archaeology museum, so we were able to use those facilities to supplement courses. One of my friends had the opportunity to do an independent curation project at the archaeology museum.

This is in addition to broad offerings in math, science, art, etc.

If you have specific questions, I’m happy to try to answer them.

This is OP. Thank you! I suppose part of my fascination with the education of the elite is the head start they receive in terms of knowing certain things. It appears there is an emphasis on languages and culture. What are other aspects of their curriculum? What about athletics?

Andover’s Course of Study is here; it’ll be much more comprehensive than anything I post: https://www.andover.edu/files/CourseOfStudy.pdf

It’s basically like going to a liberal arts college without declaring a major. You end up graduating with a broad foundation in language, history, philosophy and religion, math, science, and the arts. College was very easy in comparison.

We were all required to participate in sports all 4 years. However, it only had to be a team sport the first year. After that, it just had to be some sort of physical activity. I signed up for squash my first year and was terrible at it, so I switched to yoga, which fulfilled the requirement. We also had to pass a swim test to graduate.

Andover has a huge athletics department, though. They have a hockey rink, multiple track facilities, an Olympic-sized swimming pool, etc. There was a girl in my year who swam for the US Olympic team.

My main extracurricular was orchestra. They have three chamber orchestras, which you have to audition for, and one larger symphony orchestra. That took up a lot of time.

I also did significant community service.

I didn't know I was so interested in Andover until I read this thread, ha! I have so many questions:

Did you enjoy going there? Would you send your own kids? Did your family pay full tuition? Are your classmates all super powerful and accomplished now?

My MC dad went there in the 1950s. He was a scholarship kid. Later on a distant cousin became a headmaster there.

My dad learned to write well and passed his knowledge to me. He got an Ivy PhD. He was always more interested in being a nerd than getting ahead. So he stayed an MC scientist. One of his classmates won a Nobel Prize. Another was J Paul Bremer who administered Iraq.

I visited the school campus in 2021 to see what it might be like to send a kid there. I was contemplating a summer school program or more for my kid who was hating his local public school. As a kid, I'd also thought about prep school but dismissed it. It is a pretty campus with a classic US college vibe.

Ultimately, it's quite a choice to live apart from your family for four school years as a young teen. In both cases, I failed to overcome that first level of internal emotional objection. The boarding school kids of my own age or younger that I know have proved to have some issues (Eton guy worst of all).

I think my dad would have ended up the same if he didn't go to Andover. He certainly would have still gotten into his Ivy based on dual legacy and SATs. But he did learn Latin and good writing habits.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went to one of the top NYC privates and it's pretty much what was described above.

It can be fun to see former classmates and their parents in the news, which happens a lot. But you also see a lot of the a-holes you knew growing up doing well, and that's annoying.

My DH went to public schools in his small upper-middle class hometown then to UVA.
He is smarter than me but I am better educated. That's not necessarily gotten me any further in life though.

I can fit in pretty easily with an old-money crowd and know the social customs, the clubs and schools spoken about.
Again, it's not necessarily gotten me much farther in life.

As I mentioned on another thread, I have friends from these schools who are massreurs, follow Phish, are carpenters and potters. Going to these schools doesn't guarantee you anything in life or guarantee that you want to be in the rat race.

can you tell us about the social customs?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I went to one of the top NYC privates and it's pretty much what was described above.

It can be fun to see former classmates and their parents in the news, which happens a lot. But you also see a lot of the a-holes you knew growing up doing well, and that's annoying.

My DH went to public schools in his small upper-middle class hometown then to UVA.
He is smarter than me but I am better educated. That's not necessarily gotten me any further in life though.

I can fit in pretty easily with an old-money crowd and know the social customs, the clubs and schools spoken about.
Again, it's not necessarily gotten me much farther in life.

As I mentioned on another thread, I have friends from these schools who are massreurs, follow Phish, are carpenters and potters. Going to these schools doesn't guarantee you anything in life or guarantee that you want to be in the rat race.

can you tell us about the social customs?

DP. But what do you want to know about? How to use the extra stuff that comes with the Victorian sterling that you use every day? How to gently work class markers into conversation without being too obnoxious - IYKYK-style? Understand how to ride, play lacrosse, crew, field hockey which aren't really that rare? The Eton kid I knew was not British. He had no obvious elite markers. He once got embarrassed at me when he thought I was trying to take a picture of the tea spread at the Savoy. But when I told him I wanted a photo of his wife, he calmed down (that was before phone cameras). Wasn't sure why the prospect of my photographing food was so gauche to him.

[Anonymous]

I like to watch vlogs by people who are in boarding school. One girl is like, British but from Dubai (I'm not sure how that works) and goes to boarding school in Switzerland. She is beyond rich and has a personal trainer at her school for workouts. Another girl was just taken on a trip to Malta by her parents for her 18th birthday.

[Anonymous]

I am sure they don’t read all the race gender stuff that’s being shoved down the public school kids’ throats