Schools Guide

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Deciding to 'send children away' to board is still a major step for every family. If parents live near enough, choosing between boarding and day school can be even harder.

Here are some more points to consider.

• Boarding works well for the majority of children. Once they reach 13, they are well on the road to independence, and spending time away positively helps that process.
• Boarding helps develop inner resources and the ability to be self-reliant.
• Boarders can lean more heavily on the close friends they make at school and on the care of the staff.
• Unless parents are based abroad, they don’t say goodbye to their children for weeks at a time.
• Children who board see their parents relatively often, at weekends or on the touchline, at concerts or at plays. Parents are encouraged to drop in to see their children.
• Communication with home is also positively encouraged, and mobile phones and emails have completely changed the nature and frequency of contact between parents and children – provided they haven't lost their phone, or had it confiscated, or lent it to a friend!
• When children are at home, it becomes real quality time, with each sides appreciating the other more.
• Teenagers can be challenging, and boarding school staff have experience of most teenage issues, some many times over. They can listen, ask the difficult questions, deal calmly and constructively with crises, give good advice and support where needed, and handle the occasional rebellious outburst with a mixture of understanding and discipline. The years of adolescence can be less painful.
• A good relationship with an adult who is not a parent can also be a very positive experience for a young person.

Advantages
• Boarding gives children the opportunity to develop in their own space away from the family, and to gain their independence in a structured environment.
• Boarding allows children to broaden their horizons, and learn to live with and be tolerant of their fellow human beings, many of whom come from very different backgrounds and different parts of the country and often the world.
• Boarding allows quality time to spend with peers and time to take advantage of a huge range of activities a boarding school can offer over and above the working day, such as involvement in a theatre, endless musical opportunities, CCF, extra sport, on-site art facilities, historical and debating societies, and much, much more.
• Boarding enables children to involve themselves wholeheartedly in the life of the school without the constant change of environment from home to school that is inevitable at a day school.
• Boarding provides an ideal opportunity to be independent and gain self-confidence for life in the twenty-first century. This confidence will be with them for the rest of their lives.

Disadvantages
• Boarding is generally considered more expensive
• Boarding takes children away from the family for long periods and can result in children becoming too detached from family influences.
• Boarding can allow the development of bad habits and be more subject to the influences of unsatisfactory peer groups.
• Boarding can discourage the development of family-based recreational pursuits, and social and cultural activities, particularly over weekends and holidays.
• Boarding takes children away from the structured and disciplined environment of the home.