How Parents Should Prepare for a School Search

The school selection process can be an overwhelming experience for parents – a plethora of dates, deadlines and hours spent researching schools – making it hard to re-adjust your focus and plan accordingly. However, with a little preparation, you will be able to navigate your school search like a pro.

First step is to build a list of schools that interest you. You might already have a few in mind, but you should consider attending school fairs to discover other learning institutions. Once you have your list of schools, visit their websites to gather background information and learn about their teaching philosophies. This will also help you narrow down your list. If you know any enrolled parents, speak with them and listen to their experience — they’ve been in your shoes before.

Most schools admissions teams offer an info session and/or school tour for prospective parents, which you should highly consider attending. If it doesn’t work with your schedule, you should contact the school and ask if they can provide a private tour for a time that works best for you.

Visiting a school for the first time can be a muddled experience for parents. There is a lot of information to take in and it can be hard to keep up, especially if they’re not very familiar with the school. Before you visit, take some time to write down what you find to be important qualities of a school. This will help you form questions you want to ask during your visit. Click here to download our list of questions we recommend you ask during your school search.

Although the process may seem long and stressful at times, being prepared can help alleviate this tension and keep you going to find the best school for your kid. Interested to see how the academic day looks in a progressive classroom at Bennett Day School? Here is how a group of students learned through their shared interest of pasta.