Junior Boarding Schools

Junior Boarding Schools - A Historical Perspective

A  junior boarding school is any school that enrolls students in the middle or elementary grades, ending at 9th grade. These schools often offer a day school program for even younger students. There are currently only 124 junior boarding schools operating in the United States and Canada.

The first junior boarding school established in the United States was begun by Eliza Burnett Fay and her sister, Harriet Burnett, in 1866. Seeking to provide a more supportive, nurturing environment than the average boarding school, the two sisters opened their home to seven young male students—five day students and two boarders—and created a curriculum to fit their needs. Other junior boarding schools established during the 19th century were often attached to orphanages, where, it was presumed, the parentless children who lived there could at least be given the benefits of a good education.

Most of the junior boarding schools still in operation in the United States were founded during the first half of the 20th century. During this time, there was a drastic increase in urbanization around the country, and many well-off families felt strongly that their offspring should be educated in a rural setting, so they could learn the skills of hunting, archery, and horsemanship. Thus, many junior boarding schools promoted themselves as places where young men (and sometimes women)  could improve their minds and bodies away from the distractions of city life.

Similar to regular boarding schools, these junior boarding schools often have long and strong sporting traditions. Sports participation—sometimes in all three athletic seasons—may even be required of all students. The Fay School, which I mentioned at the beginning of this article, has grown to offer a total of 20 different sports to its 120 boarders, including wrestling, lacrosse, track, and squash. Most of these schools organize their athletes into intramural teams which compete against each other.
Owing to the younger age range of junior boarding school residents and students, the curriculum and atmosphere often places more emphasis on academic guidance and development. A boarding school for older students is more likely to adhere to a strict grading policy, with competitive, high-stakes assignments and academic honors. For younger students who may still be learning good study skills and what techniques work for them, a junior boarding school’s programs will often offer different educational strategies, learning partners, and academic counseling sessions. This way, students at junior boarding schools can learn the study skills they may need if they go on to more competitive boarding schools or prep schools for older students.

To complement this more nurturing approach to academics, junior boarding schools will often include programs focused on healthy eating, wellness strategies, and guidance for learning important life skills. Mealtimes are often served family-style, and monitored by table staff to ensure students have access to an adult at all times. Extracurricular clubs run the gamut from ordinary dramatic arts or science club to more unique offerings such as martial arts, sculpture, or even music instruction.

Boarding Schools - An Evolution

Boarding Schools - An Evolution

The tradition of sending children or teenagers away from home to be educated at a boarding school is a long one, dating back to medieval Europe. Families from the common or peasant class would, if they could afford it, send their sons to be educated by literate clergy members, in the hopes that, having gained the ability to read and write, their sons could grow up to become more than just servants and hand-to-mouth farmers. For families of a more military persuasion, sons were often sent to be educated by accomplished knights who could train them in the arts and battle and horsemanship.

Gradually, more formalized institutions of higher education began to emerge in Europe, the oldest of these being the King’s School in Canterbury, founded in AD 597. Schools of this era greatly valued the study of holy texts, emphasizing godliness above all other virtues to be gained by education. Students were taught calligraphy, and tasked with copying out ancient documents, longhand.
In the United States, education has long been organized around the agricultural calendar. In colonial days, children would attend “field schools” in wintertime, when farm work was less demanding. Soon, population centers and small cities began to organize Latin Grammar Schools, educational institutions that loosely resemble boarding schools present today. These were very strict, formal schools that emphasized the study of classical texts written in Latin and Greek. Graduates of such a school were expected to pursue a future in the clergy, or in teaching.

Soon, as towns and villages became more organized, educated individuals in the community began taking it upon themselves to establish small schools to serve the local populace. English Grammar Schools—more practical and less formal than Latin Grammar Schools—began popping up wherever teachers could be found. These schools focused on preparing students for democratic citizenship, and taught mathematics, English, grammar, geography, rhetoric, and accounting, among others.
Gradually, this very scattershot system of education gave way to more organized, well-endowed academies, which combined the high-minded educational goals of the Latin Grammar Schools with the practicality of English Grammar Schools. Students were usually housed with faculty members or trustees, and expected to live near campus during the entire academic year. In this way, each student would benefit from not only the academic influence of their studies, but from the moral guidance of their teachers and the academy community. This philosophy still resides at the heart of many modern boarding schools.

Even as the public education movement has taken off in the United States, boarding schools have persisted as a private option for parents seeking a way to get their offspring into a more positive, nurturing environment. In addition to academic instruction provided by impassioned instructors, boarding schools can provide students with new conflict resolution skills as they make their way on campus, living more independently and cohabitating with a stranger for the first time in their life. For some students, this is just the sort of new challenge they need to truly blossom as engaged learners and responsible young men and women.