Mothers and fathers are opting for more compact prep institutions

There’s not a sign of literary boarding schools about Belhaven Hill, a small boarding prep school on the Eastern Lothian shoreline, which is exactly the way Head of School Innes MacAskill likes it. The school itself looks and feels like a big family dwelling, and on days off MacAskill and his spouse take a bunch of boarders down to the nearest store to buy products for the "come dine with the principal" contest.

The classical attitudes and comfy vibes of tiny preparatory institutions such as Belhaven certainly bring in the post-economic crisis age group of parents. While the tough economy has led to a fall in enroling figures across the independent segment all together, Belhaven has grown by five percent over the last year - to a total count of 118 pupils. Figures from the Independent Schools Council show that just about 75 percent of its a hundred and fifty-four minimalist boarding institutions are generally keeping their numbers or growing.

With regards to fees, the Independent School Council’s compact preparatory institutions (with no more than just about 150 pupils) are less costly than their larger counterparts. But as outlined by Henry Knight, principal of Woodcote House School in Surrey, which has one hundred students, fathers and mothers believe they’re receiving even more worthwhile value from the personally customised method supplied by smaller sized prep institutions, than from the uniform kind of much larger institutions. His school has improved by in excess of 10 per cent in two years. "We individually communicate with every boy, and fully grasp what it really is that drives them," he states.

Marcus Peel, who leads Malsis School in Yorkshire, which has a hundred and twenty pupils and is maintaining statistics, claims that scaled-down preparatory schools provide more chances for enrolees to take initiative. "In a little community such as ours everybody is someone," he reveals. "There are boys in our 1st XV who would under no circumstances get near to a 1st team in a larger sized prep institution and it’s precisely the same for theatrical events and musicals."

But in case you want your child to go to a renowned senior school, should you not be thinking about a bigger, popular preparatory school? Richard Brown, headmaster of Dorset House, boarding institution in south-west England, whose students, similar to the close by Windlesham House School, go on to, Harrow, Wellington and Winchester, reveals that proportions has no influence on the standard of training. "There is no deficit of standards in a modest institution," he says. "Results can be obtained a lot more productively when the little ones are comfortable. It is about inclusivity, cooperation and preparing children for current issues - not sugar coating it."

Authority is an intrinsic part of lifestyle in a minimalist prep school, as outlined by Knight, and this builds students up for the raucous realm of college. "Everyone will be provided with the possibility to lead in some way," he reveals. "Not only as prefects and sports captains but also as chapel, dormitory and tuck surveyors." At Hanford School, a full-boarding organisation for a hundred young ladies in countryside Dorset, there are 4 commissions of sixth formers who complete roles all over the school and take good care of under-the-weather juniors. Barnaby Lenon, head teacher of Harrow School in NW London, notes that small schools nurture feelings of duty and self esteem: "We find that boys from small-scale institutions have a deep-seated self-confidence and feeling of duty which stems from having had command tasks at prep school," he states.

The problem of a scaled-down boarding institution is typically the features - or shortage of them. There’s a good chance the athletics and theatre centre will be a lot less sophisticated than at a larger preparatory school. But Richard Brown, whose institution has expanded by twelve per cent this year to 144 students, thinks the smaller sized institutions make up for this by giving an authentic childhood experience instead. "Compact prep institutions provide a cure for a time where the little ones develop too fast," he says.

Malsis School is dotted with trees to clamber up on, with dens and a river to dam, while Hanford School has dogs, chickens, ponies, cats and massive kitchen gardens. In the summer time children are taken riding across the countryside by "galloping matrons" before diving into a chilly open-air pool.

Tom Dawson, headmaster of the 100-place Sunningdale School in SE England, which was featured in a BBC Two docu film this past autumn and has grown by ten percent throughout this year, believes that flamboyant amenities can be a distraction. "If mother and father desire a £5 million athletics area and a 50 metre pool area, sleeping quarters with en suite amenities and flat screens then they should go to a large school which can offer all that," he says. "But if they want a school where each and every member of staff truly knows every one of the children, where there is an authentic family ambiance, where they won’t be neglected, then they will opt for a compact school."