Preparing your child for boarding school
Support your child by supporting the boarding staff
Is your child heading off to boarding school next year? As a former boarding staff member, I know boarding school can be a wonderful experience for students, which typically allows them to flourish.
But in my clinical experience, I have also seen it not go well for students and their families.
It seems there are a few essential things to put in place to ensure the transition goes well.
The most important thing is to keep in mind the purpose of what you are doing. Most times, families are sending their child to boarding school because of the opportunities provided by the arrangement.
This might be an educational experience they can’t get in their rural town or country. Or it could be that the child is more able to particulate in all the extracurricular opportunities provided by the school, without long commutes in the early morning, after school, or on weekends.
Regardless of the purpose, it’s essential that all members of the family agree to and own their part in the decision. If the child thinks that the decision is more their parents’ wish than their own, they will probably not adjust to boarding as well. They’re also likely to be more impacted by homesickness.
Make sure everyone is on the same page so no one can be blamed for the decision. If in doubt, a good idea is a pros and cons list, to ensure that you all know that you are making a decision that works best for everyone.
Boarding presents some unique challenges in terms of authority. All children in high school are going through a process of individuating, where they are asserting their individuality. This makes them more likely to disagree with authority figures who want to keep them somewhat safe under sensible rules.
If a child is living at home, then these are the years where they are much more likely to fight with their parents, in a tug of war between the child’s freedom and their safety. But for children living away from home, they are often fighting a different ‘oppressor’ — the boarding house and their rules.
The tricky thing is that often these children will complain to parents about how terrible the boarding house and their policies are. And here’s where parents stand at a crossroad.
The easiest thing that parents can do is agree with their child and say how dreadful the boarding house is. It would make parents the ‘good guys’. Heck, some parents might even call the boarding school and insist that the school change some of their rules to suit their child’s preferences.
But this makes the child at odds with the place they should feel an important part of. Also, it makes children less likely to accept the school’s authority. That’s going to make it harder for them and the school, as rules are usually made for a good reason.
Most importantly, the parent can only be purportedly lax for so long. Eventually the child will come home and need to abide by parental guidelines. This will be much harder if the parent has seemingly advocated a rule-less life.
It’s much better to empathise with a child’ dilemma. But avoid suggesting that the rules are unreasonable.
Regardless of everyone’s efforts, there are going to be some periods of homesickness for children and occasional sadness for parents, children, and siblings. There’s no real cure, other than keeping up regular calm and caring phone calls with your child. Having a shoulder to cry on occasionally — particularly for parents! — will also help.
Eventually it will become more bearable. And maybe take a little comfort that some absence might make hearts grow fonder.
Takeaway for parents
Here are some more ideas for boarding parents.
· It’s a good idea to plan weekends away from boarding in advance, so the students have breaks to look forward to.
· Agree on the schedule of phone calls, so children get time to talk to family and time to hang out with their peers after dinner.
· The good news is that boarding students do equally as well as day students, academically and socially-emotionally.
· Often boarding students develop increased responsibility and independence, learning to manage their own life more and not lean on parents too much.
