Placement
SOH seeks to provide timely placement guidance to students and parents in our Grade 3-8 and High School programs.
At the Grade 3-8 level, all 8th graders and their families may meet with the Director of Placement for individual guidance on school choices. The Director of Placement also holds three group placement sessions for families in the summer and fall. In addition, the Director of Placement provides guidance to families of students in grades 4 and 5 who have been judged ready to make the transition from a public to an independent school. Students who do leave their public schools before 8th grade to attend an independent school are no longer eligible to participate in SOH; however, they are welcome to join the HS Program when they graduate from the 8th grade.
SOH 8th grade grads 2008
The Director of Placement offers guidance to SOH families regarding boarding, Catholic, independent, and public middle and high school admissions. The Director coordinates group and individual guidance sessions, reviews applicants’ work, writes recommendations, and contacts admissions personnel on behalf of our students. The Director also visits open houses at metropolitan area college preparatory schools to gather information for SOH families and interest these schools in SOH students.
Unlike other programs, SOH does not steer students towards a particular school. The Director of Placement provides information and helps families make decisions that may be difficult, given the scarcity of aid and the needs of our students. All SOH 8th graders have been accepted to at least one high school of their choice.
The Director of the High School Program provides individual college counseling, by appointment, to SOH high school students. The Director reviews students’ high school records, offers feedback on college essays, and holds evening workshops for families and students on college admissions and financial aid. SOH has been fortunate to have excellent presentations by college counseling professionals who are eager to answer questions during workshop Q&A sessions. In addition to college counseling and workshops, the Director of the HS Program arranges and chaperones tours of colleges in the northeast. These trips help students narrow down their choices by experiencing first-hand the differences between large and small, rural and urban colleges and universities, and introduce students to opportunities they had never dreamed possible:
After participating in SOH’s fall tour of Colgate, Cornell, and Ithaca Colleges, a student wrote that he thought all good universities “were so far from home, but after seeing Colgate, my mind was completely changed. It had a warm atmosphere, and the study abroad program captured my interest. Colgate had spacious dorms and many different areas to eat and socialize…These were qualities that I had not even considered prior to the trip. I feel more prepared as I continue my search for the right college.”