Dear parent,

Welcome to this Guide to boarding schools. We hope it helps you navigate through the sometimes uncertain terrain of choosing a school. And if you are uncertain about your choices, if you consider your journey as a dark and tricky path, then boarding is perhaps that well-lit, welcoming guest house you suddenly encounter as you come round the bend on your path. Lovely staff, good food, a warm bed – and some pretty good education thrown in too!

On a recent school visit, I met a charming young boarder in first year sixth form. He explained that although he had not always been a boarder at his school, he had been a pupil since the age of three! To have already clocked up 14 years at the same school by age 17 (82 per cent of his whole life) might be unusual, but it also reinforces two positive aspects of boarding education – continuity and stability.

I had experienced five different schools by the time I arrived at my sixth as a boarder, aged 13. Everyone knows how turbulent, confusing and hard the teenage years can be, so to settle down for five years at my final school was a rare moment of stability. And to spend all that time as a boarder, clear and settled in my termtime routines and structures, surrounded by 50-plus likeminded souls, only served to reinforce that stability and continuity.

In this Guide you will read about pretty much every type of boarding school there is on offer. Large, small, rural, city, specialist, all-round, single-sex, co-ed, senior, junior, state and independent. Such a range of choices may seem a little overwhelming, and you will need to be organised and clear-headed as you approach the selection and application process.

Whatever school you choose (and make that a joint decision with your child, not for them), you can take comfort in the fact that the boarding experience will be grounding, developmental, supportive and positive –in fact, a beacon of calm in an otherwise turbulent sea.

It’s many decades since the external world has seemed so uncertain. Conflict, inflation, energy crises and industrial action are all competing for attention in a way not seen since the 1970s. As nations across the world grapple with the short-term pressures of prices, government spending and supporting a rising bill to keep its citizens healthy, leaders are also navigating the longer-term challenges of societal change and climate change.

Against such a shifting domestic and world backdrop, it’s never been more important as a parent to work with your child to find the right school for them. There has perhaps also never been a better time to look at boarding school as a well-proven way to support your child, and, in some small way, protect them from the buffeting winds outside.

Best wishes, Robin

Fletcher Chief Executive, BSA and BSA Group

The Service Parents’ Guide to Boarding Schools is a trade mark owned by BSA Group.

Published by: BSA Group Bluett House Unit 11–12 Manor Farm Cliddesden Basingstoke RG25 2JB

+44 (0)207 798 1580 bsa@boarding.org.uk www.serviceschools.co.uk

Chief Executive: Robin Fletcher

Editor: Sheila White Head of Commercial: Neil Rust from the Publisher.

Front cover photo with kind permission of Shaftesbury School