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Northfield Mount Hermon School

School rating 4 / 5 by

One Lamplighter Way Mount Hermon MA 01354 United States
Boarding
9th to PG
Day
9th to PG
Gender
Coed

Academic

Northfield Mount Hermon School review by .

NMH is very well-rounded. It seems to me the math teachers are always great; the English teachers have been around forever and are absolutely lovely; the performing arts are incredible (and intense), and the languages are rigorous and well worthwhile. The sciences are good, I guess. I didn't take many, and the really good teacher I had has retired, so I can't really give a reasonable evaluation. As far as the student body goes in being competitive or collegial, I would definitely lean on the side of collegial, although on an individual basis this may vary-- some people compete with themselves more than others. I was definitely well prepped for college in terms of expecting a heavy work-load and having already gathered how to manage my time... indeed, by comparison my college schedule is much much easier to plan than NMH's was. I do think I got a little spoiled by having so much faculty attention, though. I miss having personal connections to my teachers. But in college there aren't dorm parents and the faculty don't generally eat in the dining halls. The Head, Heart & Hand is a really essential part of NMH education. I think it is probably the most important thing I took away from the school: I learned a lot about things like US History, and French and Geometry, sure, but I think where I learned the most at NMH was at the heart level. There's a real heart in the community, even if sometimes it seems a little overwrought. And doing workjob on the farm and in the dining hall was a productive rest from the heady intellectual fervor of classes. There were hardly any lecture classes, as I can recall. Everything was discussion based, or included a great deal of discussion. Class size was smallish, reasonable (16 was big, as I recall) faculty were very very accessible (often you lived with them) and there were tutoring opportunities for those who needed it, as well as accelerated classes for the who got ahead. There is a lot of pressure to take lots of AP classes. Workload is heavy, generally speaking, but not unmanageable. Just be careful not to try and do too many extracurriculars at once. Joining choir or being involved in a musical or dance company can make it harder to get things done. Although they're revised the sports requirement since I left, so the conflicts with sports, arts and homework may have lessened.

College Counseling

College counseling was great. They do an excellent job of helping you apply to the....

Sample insights on college counseling

  • They have contacts at most of the major universities and feel perfectly comfortable picking up the phone and advocating for a student to get accepted somewhere they feel is a good fit for that student. However, these counselors are certainly not magic bullets. They cannot guarantee that a student will get into an Ivy League university...
  • For those wishing to move on to Oxford or Cambridge, the provision is second-to-none. In the months running up to application and interview, every subject faculty offers classes (often run by former Oxbridge tutors) exploring further areas of their subject as well as offering advice on personal statements, interview technique and more...

Admissions - Getting Accepted

I don't remember very much at all about my admissions process to NMH, except I....

Sample insights on admissions

  • For the interview, dress conservatively. Try to be very clean and put together. Also, I was a tour guide for two years and at the end of every tour, we were asked to evaluate the candidate so if you think the tour is not apart of the process, you are very wrong. Ask questions and be interested. Also, tip for the parents: the kids speak on the tour. Do not ask their questions for them...
  • Most younger siblings have an easy time in the admissions process. I can only think of one case of a younger sibling not being admitted. About half of the students who entered with me had come from public schools. The remainder came from private K-6 schools, or had transferred from other New York private schools The Elizabeth Morrow School and St. Bernard were two of the larger feeder schools...

School Life

The library is excellent, the librarians are wonderful, the resources are great. Dorms are very nice, although some are definitely better than others and neater-- but that depends on the residents, and varies yearly. NMH is in the middle of rural massachusetts, and leaving campus is a carefully supervised and structured activity, usually a junior/senior privilege on weeknights. Due to the rural nature of the community, it is very safe, though located in the poorest county in Massachusetts. It's also one of the most beautiful places in the world, in my opinion, and not too far away from Amherst and....

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