A consortium of boarding schools has published the results of a study contrasting the experience of approximately 1,000 boarding students (and alumni) with that of 1,000 from public and 600 from private day schools. The survey, which assessed overall satisfaction, perceptions of diversity and a variety of academic rigor issues, attempts to debunk stereotypic images of boarding schools. The results include percentages of grads who end up in top management careers, data that hints at the very elitism the consortium wishes to erase from our prejudice. Like an admission brochure, the news is all great.
My sense is that boarding schools are really pretty good, and that if we were known honestly and accurately, the right people would find the right schools and the industry would flourish. I'm not convinced that we are the victims of public misunderstanding.
If people think of prep schools as elitist, maybe we should push our marketing resources into telling it like it is.
This strategy would enable the real truth to be revealed: we are--more than anything else--not alike. In fact, we comprise the most independent industry in the United States. I like that!
