Guildford Living Dec - Jan 2020 10.29.04

Image courtesy Cottesmore Prep School
TOP TIPS FOR CHOOSING A
BOARDING SCHOOL
The unique educational experience
provided by a British boarding school offers
busy families a top-quality education with
built-in flexibility. And although academic
achievement is important, it is the ‘extras’
that really make a boarding school
experience count.
Boarding fosters meaningful relationships
with peers and house staff, enabling pupils
to gain independence and experience
a breadth of opportunities. But with so
many institutions offering so many different
experiences, choosing the right school for
your child can seem daunting. Below are
our top tips to consider when choosing a
boarding school.
1. Narrow your search
Single sex or co-ed? Country or city? Faith
school or not? Some schools will say they
take children of all faiths and none, and they
do, but sometimes a family finds the overall
ethos and ‘climate’ of a faith school to
their taste, regardless of their own religious
views.
2. Study the detail
Every child is different - a rower will want a
school near a river, a rugby player a good
record of the sport in the school and a
violinist great music rooms. Many families
nowadays consider location first - can you
get there to watch a game or a play, or even
in an emergency?
3. Do your research
Boarding schools are like universities - you
don’t have to be local, nor to take a month
touring the country. The modern wouldbe
applicant goes online and drills into
individual websites which can tell you a lot
in what schools don’t say or in how they say
what they do.
4. Visit
Visit several schools. Get the feel. Is
lunchtime a noisy scrum? Are corridors
orderly between lessons? Do pupils look
you in the eye? All these give you a flavour
of the school over and above the publicity,
the motto, the official words. Eyes open,
compare notes.
5. Ask for a pupil tour
This is partly for you to see all parts of the
school, but more to ask questions. Is the
food really as good as they say? How much
is there to do at weekends?
6. Check out the weekend
programme
You may want a school which offers weekly
boarding, but if a school has a large number
of weekly boarders, the numbers staying
at weekends can reduce dramatically, and
that makes providing a wide enough range
of activities difficult. If you want your child to
be at school at weekends, ask for details of
what was done in the last couple of weeks,
and exactly how many boarders were on
the premises.
7. Talk to staff
And not just the Head. House staff,
matrons, tutors, cleaners and caretakers –
these are the people at the sharp end of
your child’s care. Do you like them? Would
you trust them with your child? If you’re
worried and email them, will they reply and
when?
8. Involve your child
Whatever the final decision, your child will
have to live it. This school will be his or her
home for several years. Here, he or she
will make friends for life and forge bonds
that will sustain them through their whole
lives. They have to feel it is right for them.
Trust your child’s gut reaction. Becoming a
boarder is a growing-up kind of decision -
let them have a major say in the final choice.
For further information and boarding school
searches, please visit www.boarding.org.uk.
Robin Fletcher
Chief Executive
Boarding Schools’ Association
12 | www.guildfordliving.co.uk