How difficult is Holton Arms actually?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The toughest thing about Holton is the mean girls and the families they come from. Sharks in the water just waiting for you.

+100

[Anonymous]

There are mean girls everywhere but without a doubt they’re concentrated at HA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I did not go there and neither did my children.

The only thing I can discuss are women that I know IRL who went there - outside counsel, friends, colleagues. None of them are super successful. Just regular worker bees.

How old are they? Holton used to be a pretty unimpressive, not very rigorous school for righ girls who couldn’t get into harder schools like Sidwell or ncs. Or didn’t want to work hard enough to go there. Supposedly it has gotten harder.

I can’t imagine that is true. I went to college 20 years ago (a college with <5% admission rate now) with a few Holton grads and they were impressive then and remain so now. We live in VA so I can’t send mine there unfortunately

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I did not go there and neither did my children.

The only thing I can discuss are women that I know IRL who went there - outside counsel, friends, colleagues. None of them are super successful. Just regular worker bees.

How old are you? Mine went there and is a millionaire (age 29). She is brilliant. Many of her classmates were brilliant too. In fact, when my dd started there in middle school, and I met some of the girls. I was amazed by the impressive work they did.

How gauche to come online and brag about your child’s earnings.

If it were a man's earnings, you would have no issue with it. You are mired in your patriarchical misogony.

NP: I think it is in bad taste either way. extremely financially successful would suffice for the description of your child of any gender, if you feel the need to share.

NP. It’s an anonymous message board. If you can’t bluntly share here, then where can you?

[Anonymous]

Some students are striving for top grades and are stressed. Other stdents are less motivated and are not. It depends on the DC (and maybe family pressure on DC). This is true at many many schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some students are striving for top grades and are stressed. Other stdents are less motivated and are not. It depends on the DC (and maybe family pressure on DC). This is true at many many schools.

+1. And it also depends on the rigor of the course load and intensity of after school activities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The toughest thing about Holton is the mean girls and the families they come from. Sharks in the water just waiting for you.

You mean NCS?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The toughest thing about Holton is the mean girls and the families they come from. Sharks in the water just waiting for you.

You mean NCS?

I have no direct connection to either school, but anecdotally, the girls and parents I’ve met at NCS are far nicer and more down to earth than those at HA

[Anonymous]

NCS is a nerdier and more alternative in a good way. Holton has a type and it's more right leaning although not conservative. Both have really nice kids.

[Anonymous]

NCS is much nerdier. My daughter is in the upper school. At least half the girls are super quiet, studious types who wouldn't hurt a fly.
There are less than 10 social/popular girls who actually go to parties, etc.
My daughter has never reported any mean girl behavior.

[Anonymous]

HA is not a great place for the academically challenged. She would be surrounded by high achieving, competitive girls. In all likelihood your DD's self esteem and confidence would suffer no matter how much academic support you profivde.

[Anonymous]

My daughter graduated from Holton-Arms recently and there was a terrific amount of homework. The English classes were college level. In fact her freshman year in college was a breeze because of the prep she has at Holton. I did not agree with everything the school did but as far as prepping for college they did a fantastic job. Many of the kids in her classes in college were ill prepared.

[Anonymous]

I went to a peer school and graduated a while ago. Working hard in HS is not a bad thing. I was an average HS school, went to a top 30 University (towards the bottom of the list) and had the best time in college b/c it was so easy compared to HS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went to a peer school and graduated a while ago. Working hard in HS is not a bad thing. I was an average HS school, went to a top 30 University (towards the bottom of the list) and had the best time in college b/c it was so easy compared to HS.

This. I was a top HS student at a podunk high school, and went to a top 20 uni and was crushed freshman year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have met HA alums who claim their high school experience consisted of late nights, burnout, and depression due to the "pressure cooker" nature of the school. I have also heard from current/past students and their families who say that the workload, content, etc is incredibly manageable and have plenty of free time outside of academics. Does anyone know why this is? Or what type of girls will have an easier time?

The students who have balanced lives are the ones that use their time wisely. If they can knock out 2~3 classes worth of homework in school by using study halls and time before or after sports, the evenings are more than manageable.

Teens procrastinate by and large but efficiency is key. I don’t think this is exclusive to Holton; I think every well rounded student is time efficient. Having the extra time then allows extracurriculars, sports, jobs, fun with with friends. Every one of my dd friends that is (relatively) happy and had great college application results is like this.

This!!!! Cant speak to HA but I went to visi and I did not do this. This habit would have been a game changer. Esp at places that mindless assign an insane amount of work instead of teaching how to think deeply about intellectual things like visi.