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Have you seen "Dead Poet's Society?" It's a fictionalized movie, of course, but it's closer to the real thing than you think. The majestic, leafy campuses of some of the best prep schools are thousands of miles from sunny SoCal, and often seem a lot farther than that. Some students are sent by parents, some attend by virtue of long family lineage, some are attracted to the grandeur and prestige of it all, and others - like me - just want something different. It's not for everyone. Trading Tuesday afternoons at the beach and Thursday nights at house parties for required classes, athletics, and most weeknights voluntarily spent in the cavernous oak-paneled reading rooms at the library. Many students will remain there until sign-in. But for those willing to make the trade, going to a top-tier prep school offers a world of rewards. At 14, I moved into Rockwell House at Andover, Mass., and I'd never had friends who didn't live near me. The difference was startling: my neighbors were from Boston, New York, Cincinnati, Houston, Delaware, Saudi Arabia, Hong Kong, and everywhere in between, all races, religions, incomes, and whatever categories you can imagine. But there was no culture shock: thrown in the mix together, we formed, in prep school tradition, a culture of our own. Of course, everyone gets this, perhaps with less unity, in college. I don't claim it a unique experience. But fresh out of 8th grade, this was pretty cool. Academics are the fountain from which boarding schools draw their life. The best advice I can offer is this: If you're at the top of your class at home, don't hold your breath. Nevertheless, those who can become honors students will, with very few exceptions, gain admittance to Ivy League schools and their ilk. In the meantime, you will use textbooks written by your teachers; see your instructors interviewed on national networks; and receive the benefits afforded by outrageously large endowments. (Andover's tops most universities, at $700 million, and other schools are similarly wealthy.) No, budget constraints will not hamper your education, and if you have a viable idea - a pizza for your group's meeting, a bus for a group trip to see Howard Dean, a stint studying marine biology on the Italian Coast next summer - chances are good the school will treat. Visitors are endless: in my junior (called Upper) and senior years alone, I dined with Desmond Tutu, William Sloane Coffin, and Julia Alvarez; played bass with Wynton Marsalis; attended lectures by Alan Dershowitz and the U.S. ambassador to China; and passed on five times more such opportunities. But to get this, you will trade in the normal American high school experience for something dramatically different. All boarding schools have evening sign-in - usually around 10 p.m. - and some have required nightly study hall. Almost all demand coats and ties to class every day and require chapel attendance. Most are one-chance schools, so being caught cheating, drinking, or committing other offenses means expulsion. Thus you will see good, and sometimes best, friends depart abruptly. To perform well in school, you will often stay up through the night. Even to perform poorly, you will work more than honors students here at home; I know this first-hand. But you will also have fun, and your friends will eventually stand atop their fields. Prep schools offer the chance to live with your friends during your formative high school years; to spend long weekends in Manhattan and Christmas breaks with friends around the country and enjoy a grad party circuit hundreds of miles long; to join a brotherhood of fellow prep school grads who feel an instant bond upon meeting for the first time. If you are willing to take this chance, you won't be let down. Jeremy Beecher, 18, of Corona del Mar, will attend USC this month. He is a summer intern at Churm Publishing, Inc. |
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