To ask you, if you despise boarding school, what exactly you think goes on there?

[RainyDaysAndMondaysNeverGetMeDown]

As the title says, if you are one of the many anti-boarding school parents on here, what exactly do you think happens to children at boarding school?

And yes, I am a parent of boarders, having sworn I'd never be.
But having seen how my DCs have thrived (in a school 20 minutes away!) I'm curious to see how much of the perception is reality.

Ok I think I need to share some more about why I had such a bad time at school.
i went in the 90s. I didn’t get a choice, my dad was military and it’s what you did. I spent about a hour looking round the school before I went.
when I arrived, we were not allowed to communicate with our parents for 3 weeks, no letters no phone calls. I was, of course, dreadfully homesick. Once we were allowed to call home we had to do so once a week sat in the house mistresses study with her watching and listening to everything you said, so you could never ever be honest.

Discipline, while not corporal punishment, was still brutal. The smallest thing you did wrong meant you had to get up at 5am and do pointless things like running laps round the hockey pitches alone in the dark for an hour, or circling vowels in a newspaper. I was a disorganised child and was ‘on punishment’ at least once a week, often more. I was a sleep deprived nervous wreck, terrified of the next thing I would get wrong.

there was never any choice in foods, the food quality was terrible and there wasn’t enough. Now I have real issues with binge eating. I also eat very quickly as, if you were a slow eater, you stood the risk of someone taking your food from you.

i could never tell my parents how I really felt - I knew they were struggling to pay the fees, and besides which everyone we knew sent their kids to school. They were too invested in the whole thing and I couldn’t bare to tell them how miserable I was. As a consequence I’m very very low contact with them now, we just don’t know or understand each other.

most of my issues stem from the adults providing ‘care’ and the boarding school set up, not from bullying or things you would find in day schools.

as an adult I’ve been left with a real need to follow rules precisely and carefully, I’ve no tolerance for people doing things wrong, making mistakes or doing things differently. I don’t trust anyone and I generally won’t ask for help with anything - I am very independent but it’s to a fault. I also have the binge eating disorder as well.

my daughter is about to start senior school next week and I’ve been surprised by how much of my past is being stirred up by this (I went away at 11, which was considered ‘late’ among my peers). I’ve had counselling in the last few years which has really helped. My marriage was at breaking point when we went to relate and the counsellor there pointed out that I showed many signs of ‘boarding school syndrome’ (I’d never heard of it before).

gosh this is a long and slightly cathartic post!!

Anyway, hopefully you can see from this that boarding school made me the basket case I am today, and that there’s a very good reason I wouldn’t send my child to one!!!

What's the opposite of jealousy?

That's what i feel about boarding school. I wouldn't send my dc to boarding school no matter how much money i had.

The thing I have learnt as DCs get older is that in some ways they need you more in the teenage years. Navigating puberty, peer relationships, school work etc are difficult and they want to come home and talk about it, have a hug and some time away from peers.

I can't imagine how that would work if kids were away all week. Sometimes it's about picking up on body language that shows they've had a bad day and asking them about it.

DD’s friend (14y) was sent a dick pic by a boy (15y) who boards. When it was looked into and his phone confiscated it became clear that his mates in his dorm were illuminating his private parts with their lights on their phones as he took the photo. Bleurgh. The friends were also instrumental in encouraging the dick pics and requesting reciprocal photos.
The problem with boarding schools is the kids are raised by their peers, and they all have access to whatever they like online, and are becoming warped.

I agree. Sometimes just the way they came in the kitchen. It would prompt a gentle conversation and all sorts of stuff can get teased out and sorted. They really need close parenting in the teenage years.

I'm sorry that happened to you - it sounds very traumatic and more like a prison than a school. Maybe some kind of specific trauma therapy wouldn't be too much of a reach? EMDR is good and it works quite quickly.

Because, having worked in a very good boarding school, it becomes increasingly hard to explain to children why they are boarding when their parents live twenty mins away. Boarding hardens children - it has to. Walls go up. Most come to mostly enjoy it, but it's not without an emotional price.

Mixed feelings. It is good that your DC are enjoying their boarding experience and it does sound right for them. But generally, I'm against boarding. My brother boarded age 7 to 13. We don't really have a relationship as adults, he truggles with all his family and has hardly ever had a romantic relationship to my knowledge. It's very sad, I feel like I lost my little brother when he went away and even though he came back at 13 (chorister school) he was a changed person.

My DC are 7 and 9 and absolutely no way I could send them away. But older DC who may thrive...that could be different. It's just so well documented, the negative impact of boarding, that I do struggle with it though. Much sympathy to everyone who's been affected.

I always find it strange when people have such strong feelings towards other parents’ decisions. All children are different. Boarding schools vary, and are, on the whole, vastly different from how they were even a generation ago.

As someone who has children at a school with a boarding option, I can see it from both sides. Some children benefit from coming home each evening. Others thrive in a structured boarding system and often ask their parents if they can board. They love it.

Personally I would much rather put a 13 year old into a boarding school than put a 6 month old baby into full time nursery. I’d also choose a boarding school over sending them to a day school with serious behaviour problems, violence, and serious bullying issues. Every parent is different though, with different opinions. Every parent is doing what they feel is best for their family and children. What do some judge others for their decisions?

Should add that out of his peer group, several are now dead due to suicide or addiction.

Local comp attender here. I was bullied horribly at school and the only saving grace was being able to come home at the end of the day to get away from it.

I would not want to send my child away to be educated, no matter how 'superior' that education was supposed to be. I'd opt to spend that money on extra tuition, if needed. My child's mental health is far more important than going to a 'good school'.

It’s not so much that I think anything particularly bad happens at boarding school. I just don’t want to not see my child for days/weeks/months, I couldn’t cope.

I'm against boarding schools because I believe children need their parents. They need a cuddle from someone who cares after a bad day, or if they're feeling poorly. They need to know that someone who loves them unconditionally is always there for them.

I'm also against full time nursery for small children for similar reasons. I understand why people think they need it in modern society but it's not for me. Why have children if you're going to outsource the majority of their care?

Two of the most unstable, emotionally immature men I've ever met went to boarding school. Both of them blame their issues on the fact they went to boarding school.

Well that’s the point of the thread. OP is asking for opinions. Opinions tend to be based on personal judgements.

That kind of behaviour is a problem across society, and is certainly not limited to boarding schools. Boarding schools usually have much stricter controls over phone use than most parents seem to. Yes, some choose to break those rules (and will usually face serious sanctions if caught), but to suggest that boarding school pupils are more likely to do things like this is somewhat deluded.

The most inappropriate sexual conversations my children have heard have been started by boys at state day schools.

I don't despise boarding school because of anything I think goes on there. Quite the opposite, I think if parents are the type to send their kids there in the first place, boarding school is probably a healthier place for them to be!

I disapprove of parents who send their kids there, not the schools themselves.

I don't think you should have children if you will send them away for the majority of the year. I don't care what the reason is for sending them, you're clearly putting something else (career, relationships, lifestyle) above your children's most very basic needs (to spend time with one of their parents on a daily basis!) and that makes you unfit to be a parent. I feel the same about parents who work such long hours that their kids don’t see them during the week, but at least those kids have a “second place” to escape to where they’re not surrounded by school and schoolmates 24/7.

ExDP was a boarder from 6-16.

I strongly believe behind sent to boarding school is what has left him unable to understand what healthy parenting / family dynamics / family life looks like. He’s a good dad (we coparent, after a fashion) but it takes a lot of modeling/ teaching/ explaining from me, to make it work.

he himself says he would never ever want us to
send DS to board, which says it all for me.

There are 2 schools with boarding options in our town, and one just outside the town. I know several people who's kids board a few nights a week at one, which I think is a lot different from full boarding.
I think there must be extremely few circumstances that could justify sending eg an 8 year old to full boarding school

Excellent points

My feelings about boarding school are mainly derived from my experiences growing up with a DM who went to boarding school from the age of seven. She always said, if asked, that it was 'fine'. I'm not so sure at all. I think it affected her relationship with me profoundly. She would shame me out of expressing anger or any negative emotions - and I am pretty sure this was coming from her own upbringing. A culture of repressed emotions gets passed down through the generations.

This for me.

I don’t have any strong feelings on it. I guess for some children it’s better than having to move constantly as their parents are posted in different locations as part of their jobs. I’m sure many kids love it too. I think my son would have thrived at boarding school, and I think it would have destroyed my daughter. They grow up so quickly, my son’s at Uni now and I’d imagine that’s how it feels when they are boarding, so for me I wouldn’t want that to come any sooner than 18. But I don’t judge people who use them, but I think they have to accept that their DC could say in their adult life that it was the wrong thing and not send their own DC there (which you can on this thread).

No sure what schools you are thinking of but I went to 2 boarding private schools. Out of 4 of us 3 in my dorm were from single parent families because parents were working, we were weekly borders which meant we went home at weekends, others were from forces children & were termly borders. Think these struggled the most. I loved school played rounders in the summers did all the extra activities that I wouldn’t have done at home due to lack of transport & living rurally. Some of us worked in the nhs I did not hold a powerful job I was shop floor. I went for 2 years to a comp, but my education went down the pan in those years. You think you know what boarding schools are like think again, if you are talking about public schools, that is a different kettle of fish & again your comment is a massive generalisation. Mine was a girls school think boys schools are different.

I heard a quote once which kind of summed it up for me, there are parents who parent, and there are parents who pay other people to do their parenting .. that's boarding school for me - so
Many people I know who went to boarding school have trauma, some years had good times and a good education, but it's the everything else that's the problem, and IMO that's not acceptable