The Hotchkiss School

The Hotchkiss School is an independent boarding school located in Lakeville, Connecticut. Founded in 1891, the school provides an education of unsurpassed quality to 578 students in grades 9 through 12, and to a small number of postgraduates. Students at Hotchkiss come from across the United States and 26 foreign countries. Graduates attend many of the most selective universities and colleges.

The Hotchkiss School strives to develop in students a lifelong love of learning, responsible citizenship, and personal integrity. We are a community based on trust, mutual respect, and compassion, and we hold all members of the community accountable for upholding these values.

The School is committed to mastery of learning skills, development of intellectual curiosity, excellence, and creativity in all disciplines, and enthusiastic participation in athletics and other school activities. We encourage our students to develop clarity of thought, confidence and facility in expressing ideas, and artistic and aesthetic sensitivity. We expect all members of the community, in and out of the classroom, to subject their views and actions to critical examination and to accept responsibility for them. We hope that our graduates will leave Hotchkiss with a commitment to service to others and to environmental stewardship, and with a greater understanding of themselves and of their responsibilities in a global society.

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The Hotchkiss School

Academics at Hotchkiss reflect our mission to inspire a lifelong love of learning in each and every student. Asked what most defines the learning experience, our students and faculty quickly arrive at the word ?rigor.? Everyone works hard, but at the end of the day, there?s a feeling of exhilaration. As one student says, ?You get rigor, but more important, you get fascination.?

One of the first things you?ll notice about our classes: students and teachers are genuinely caught up in the excitement and momentum of learning. Our average class size is 12, and the learning environment is intimate, interactive, and inclusive. Most humanities classes, for example, are taught around oval seminar tables, which results in animated discussions and active learning. In all of our classes, students have opinions. They speak up. They disagree. They learn from their teachers?and from one another.

By design, the academic program at Hotchkiss is both flexible and broad: each student works closely with an advisor to plan a balanced program of study. Since we know our students well, we can guide them in the direction that best fits their interests, ambitions, and passions. We offer a curriculum designed to prepare students for the rigors and rewards of college, community, and life.

What do our students achieve with a Hotchkiss education? Recent graduates attend colleges and universities throughout the nation and even abroad. Older alumni have found success in a wide range of career fields including the arts, public service, medicine, industry, and education. More to the point, they are making the choices that are best for them.

Academic AdvisingTo help students make the best choices from the wide array of opportunities at Hotchkiss, we have an advising system that puts each student in frequent contact with a faculty advisor. Almost every Hotchkiss teacher serves as an advisor. Initially, we match students and advisors, but students are also free to choose their own. In most cases, though, student and advisor are together from the student?s first days at Hotchkiss through graduation.

Advisors are often the adults students rely on most: the person who will encourage you to try creative writing even though chemistry has always been your thing, the person who brings affection as well as expectations to all your interactions. Together, advisor and student plan an academic and extracurricular program that fits a student's interests, meets diploma requirements, and puts the student in the best possible position for college applications. Advisors are also the key link in Hotchkiss? partnership with parents, keeping them informed, and helping them to resolve any issue or concern.

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Asked to describe what it?s like to teach at Hotchkiss, one of our faculty members puts it this way: ?Hotchkiss is a ?prep? school. We prepare you for moments when you begin to catch on to your real interests, maybe even your passion. We prepare you for moments when you begin to understand the part you will play in the world.?

We look for teachers who are enthusiastic about learning, experts in their subject areas, and genuinely excited about working with adolescents. All of our faculty members have degrees in their primary teaching area, and 72 percent hold advanced degrees. To their classrooms, Hotchkiss teachers bring infectious energy and enthusiasm. Styles vary. In one history classroom, a teacher might lead the discussion, while in the next, another might organize small groups of students to work collaboratively to prepare an argument. In science class, a lab might be completed in a traditional laboratory setting, or the teacher might take students outside to study the coefficient of friction by sliding a toboggan down one of the School?s hills.

Most of all, our teachers are role models for the practice that learning never ends, can take place in leaps and bounds as well as in small increments, and can happen in a number of settings. More than teachers, they are students? advisors, coaches, and constant sources of support. They are avid about everything from community service and fly-fishing to reading and cooking. Students and teachers come together every day in classes, the dining hall, the auditorium, all-school meetings, and in countless person-to-person exchanges.

With more than 200 courses in 16 departments, our academic program offers a breadth and depth most students will not experience until they reach college. The core curriculum covers English, the arts, foreign language, history, mathematics, and science. All departments offer electives, independent studies, and advanced courses at the AP level and beyond. Whether you want to write and direct your own theater production, carry out environmental research in the surrounding wetlands, or explore a new learning environment with one of our affiliated off-campus programs, Hotchkiss can help you pursue your talents and interests as far as you want to go.

Courses and classes at Hotchkiss prepare students for college. Above all, however, our academic program is designed to help students make informed, imaginative, thoughtful decisions, and become enthusiastic learners throughout life.

A real Hotchkiss distinction: within a rigorous framework, we give each student the opportunity to pursue an academic program suited to individual needs. Students have the freedom, the opportunity, and the support to pursue their academic and artistic interests.

From classrooms equipped with SmartBoards to an 87,000-volume library, a newly renovated science building, and a world-class music and arts center, Hotchkiss provides the academic resources students need to explore their own interests, to give voice or vision to their own ideas, and to communicate in the languages of various subject areas. The facilities and resources our students use are widely available without lengthy waits.

Since the beginning, the School's Main Building has been the academic?and social?center of the Hotchkiss campus. A Hotchkiss student attends class, studies, eats, meets friends, and does library research in Main. Students and teachers come together every day in classes, theater rehearsals, chapel meetings, and in countless person-to-person exchanges. And it?s a quick walk from Main Building to the Griswold Science Building, where the science and film and photography classrooms and departments are located.

Everyone at Hotchkiss is connected to one another?and to the wider world. Each dormitory room is wired for high-speed access to the campus network and the Internet, as are campus workstations located in the Ford Library and the Watson Computer Center.

Affordable TechnologyHotchkiss does not require students to bring their own computers, but the School works closely with CDW-G and IBM to bring an affordable computer solution to everyone in the Hotchkiss community. The School has negotiated special pricing, at a savings of $300 to $500, for excellent quality laptop computers that will fit the needs of the Hotchkiss student while here on campus and well after graduation.

Main BuildingThe Main Building houses 30 spacious teaching classrooms, many equipped with SmartBoards (network-linked computerized whiteboards). Also centrally located in Main: the Black Box Theater, the Esther Eastman Music Center, Edsel Ford Memorial Library, the modern languages laboratory, the Tremaine Gallery, and the Watson Computer Center.

The Watson Computer CenterIn a world in which rapidly changing technology is a fact of daily life, Hotchkiss keeps students on top of the technological learning curve. The Watson Computer Center is the largest of several advanced computer facilities that provide students and faculty with advanced technology for their disciplines, Internet and intranet access, and access to campus file servers and e-mail. The Center houses 35 PC-compatible computers, along with scanners, printers, and presentation systems; in addition, there are a dozen Macintosh machines available for advanced work in music and the arts. Other computer labs are located in the mathematics and modern languages departments, the science building, and the library.

In addition to the numerous computers available for student use on campus, the library has a limited number of laptops available for students to check out overnight. While Hotchkiss doesn?t require students to bring their own computers, many choose to do so. For an overview of the School?s recommendations for computer equipment, please click here.

The Edsel Ford Memorial LibraryThe Edsel Ford Memorial Library?s collections put students in touch with time-honored texts and the latest information technology. All materials, regardless of format, are available on open shelves in a fully integrated and accessible arrangement.

Opened in 1952, the library was renovated in 1981, increasing its size to 25,000 square feet. Some of what you?ll find: 250 carrels, 30 computer workstations, 20 laptops (available for students to check out), 87,000 volumes, and a catalog with access to more than 3,000 e-book titles. The on-line public access catalog, available at workstations throughout the library, provides sophisticated, easy access to the collection. Membership in the On-line Computer Library Center (OCLC), a consortium of more than 41,000 libraries throughout the world, provides interlibrary loan access to more than 47 million items. The library also provides campus-wide access to remote databases for work in all major disciplines. Journal articles, digital images, book reviews, and abstracts are easily accessible through powerful on-line indices from any location on the campus network.

In the sciences, Hotchkiss provides students with the tools they need to discuss and understand scientific ideas. The Griswold Science Building is a newly renovated and continually updated facility with state-of-the-art classrooms that integrate discussion space with hands-on laboratories specifically designed for each scientific discipline. Some highlights:

Labs/seminar classrooms for biology, chemistry, and physics, as well as astronomy-optics and limnology
A multi-discipline lab/classroom accommodating science electives such as engineering, geology, and forensics
A grow room equipped with appropriate lighting racks for growth experiments
A microscopy room with a scanning electron microscope and other high-powered microscopes
A computer resource room housing science periodicals, a weather station, and a half-dozen computer workstations
A 115-seat lecture hall equipped with advanced audiovisual capabilities

Beyond Griswold Science Building, the various ecosystems of Hotchkiss?s natural areas (encompassing more than 500 acres of woods, two lakes, wetlands, fields, brooks, and ponds) together with nearby caves and an old-growth forest provide an extraordinary lab for hands-on learning in courses such as AP Environmental Science, Limnology (lake studies), and Stream Ecology. In fact, Hotchkiss was one of the first schools to adopt the new College Board curriculum in AP Environmental Science.

Art and Performance Facilities
Many students come to Hotchkiss for the extraordinary training and arts education they can receive here. In support of our arts program, the School offers superb studio and performance facilities at the heart of the Hotchkiss campus.

Most students will find academics at Hotchkiss to be challenging as well as exciting. To support student adjustment to increased expectations, a number of services are in place.

The Study Skills Program
This program provides academic support and specific assistance with time management, study skills, reading, and writing. Some 80 percent of Hotchkiss students use these services at some point in their Hotchkiss career.

Additional Support OptionsStudy Halls
A two-hour period each evening is set aside for study purposes. Most students study in their dorm rooms, but some avail themselves of more structured options based on the recommendations of their class deans.

Extra Help
Students may arrange a 20?30 minute session per week with their teachers for help with specific classes.

Student Tutors
Student tutors may be available through the community service organization, the St. Luke's Society. Contact the student's advisor or Mr. Lou Pressman, advisor to St. Luke's.

Faculty Tutors
Faculty tutors may be hired in rare instances where a student would benefit from a faculty member other than his or her own teacher. Contact the student's advisor who will speak with the department head.

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Head of School Welcome

Like the blue of the sky, choice surrounds us. Or lives with us, if we are privileged to be able to choose, as does the beat to the heart. We live by the choices we make.

In 2006 I chose to come to Hotchkiss as the School?s
12th Head.

We are a New England boarding school, deeply rooted for over 100 years in a tradition of schooling that stands proudly amongst the finest in the world. We don?t ever forget that.
We show it in our attitudes to academic learning, to the arts, and to athletics.

We feel it in our appreciation of the beauty and power of our land and landscapes here in rural Connecticut. Above all, we grow it in our attitudes to each other and in the ways in which we develop character and mature as individuals. This grand heritage is one reason why I, a world traveler, was so enthusiastic about planting myself here.

We are a community, a rare thing in a fractured world. We learn to live and work and play and have fun together, and we continue to strive to make our community ever more coherent, creative, and compassionate. Our community feeling comes through in many ways, even architecturally. Our Main Building still functions as a one-room schoolhouse.

For a school of under 600 students, we have an abundant, rich program. We are a small school with a large range. Personal attention is a hallmark of our relationships. At the same time, breadth is a hallmark of our curriculum. This is an unusual combination.

We encourage the taking of risks. Education is a dangerous business. That?s a strange thing to say, isn?t it? Not dangerous in that it threatens life -- oh, no! But dangerous because it challenges us, it makes us wish to take on new ventures and try unknown experiences. We never learned to walk without bumping a nose, or ride a bicycle without grazing a knee. Education like this enlivens us and provokes opportunity. The untraveled world beckons, gleaming. Here
we don?t want the shock of the new to become the comfort of the known.

We are attentive to the great needs of our times. Environmental responsibility and global citizenship are clarion calls that we hear clearly. Prep for college is vital, but prep for the planet is a more compelling matter, a matter of survival. Our school with its wonderful resources is focused on sending out graduates who will grapple with such major issues. This is a duty. Education here is for life, a life of beneficial works and of serving others, and so it should be.

It is easy to say such things. It is more difficult to do them. Here, we try to do what we say, and most often we succeed.

It is my pleasure to invite you to get to know more about our wonderful school, Hotchkiss.

Malcolm H. McKenzie
Head of School

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Hotchkiss is located in the "Northwest Corner" of Connecticut, minutes from both New York State and Massachusetts. It is two hours north of New York City, three hours west of Boston, and approximately an hour?s drive from Hartford, Albany, and Poughkeepsie.

Driving to Hotchkiss:

From the North

From Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine:
Take the Massachusetts Turnpike (I-90) west to Lee (exit 2). Follow Route 102 to Stockbridge. In Stockbridge, turn left onto Route 7 south. Follow Route 7 south through Great Barrington and Sheffield, Massachusetts, and across Connecticut state line. In Canaan, turn right onto Route 44. Follow Route 44 west through Salisbury into Lakeville. At flashing light in Lakeville, turn left onto Route 41. Follow Route 41 to the four-way stop with flashing light at the top of hill. Turn right onto Route 112. The school entrance is 100 yards on the right.

Note: From Western Vermont it is generally faster to take Route 22 South through New York State. From Burlington take Route 7 South to 22A in Vergennes. Take Route 22 to Millerton, NY. At the stoplight in Millerton, turn left onto Route 44. Follow Route 44 through Millerton and across state line into Connecticut. Turn right onto Route 112. Follow Route 112 through one four-way stop and up hill to the school entrance on left.

From the South

From New York City:
Take I-684 north to the end, where it becomes Route 22 north in Brewster, New York. Follow Route 22 to Amenia, New York. At the traffic light in Amenia, turn right onto Route 343. Follow Route 343 to Sharon, Connecticut. In Sharon, at the four-way stop facing a stone clock tower, turn left onto Route 41. Follow to the intersection with Route 112 with a four-way stop (about 5 miles). Turn left onto Route 112. The school entrance is 100 yards on the right.

Note: From Long Island take either the Throgs Neck Bridge or the Whitestone Bridge to the Hutchison River Parkway. This becomes I-684. Follow directions from New York City above.

From the Taconic Parkway:
Take the Taconic to the Route 44/Millbrook exit. Follow Route 44 east to Amenia and go straight through the one traffic light onto Route 343. Follow Route 343 to Sharon, Connecticut. In Sharon, at the four-way stop facing a stone clock tower, turn left onto Route 41. Follow to the intersection with Route 112 with a four-way stop (about 5 miles). Turn left onto Route 112. The school entrance is 100 yards on the right.

From Route 7 north:
Follow Route 7 through Cornwall Bridge and West Cornwall. Turn left onto Route 112 toward Lime Rock and Lakeville. Follow Route 112 to intersection with Route 41. Go straight through blinking light. The school entrance is 100 yards on the right.

From the East

From Bradley International Airport (Hartford - Springfield):
The nearest airport to Hotchkiss is Bradley International, located in Windsor Locks, Connecticut. Follow the airport exit to Route 20 west. Follow signs to Route 219 south. Turn left onto Route 219; continue on Route 219; then bear right onto Route 318 west. Follow Route 318 until the end; turn right onto Route 44 in Winsted. Follow Route 44 west through Winsted, Norfolk, Canaan, Salisbury, and into Lakeville. At flashing light in Lakeville, turn left onto Route 41. Follow Route 41 to the four-way stop with flashing light at the top of hill. Turn right onto Route 112. The school entrance is 100 yards on the right.

From I-91 and I-84 (Hartford Area):
Follow I-84 west through Hartford. Exit in Farmington onto Route 4. Follow Route 4 through Torrington and into Goshen. In Goshen, turn right onto Route 63. After approximately 12 miles, turn left onto Route 126. Follow Route 126 to Route 7. Turn left onto Route 7 south, and follow to Route 112. Turn right onto Route 112. Follow Route 112 to intersection with Route 41. Go straight through blinking light. The school entrance is 100 yards on the right.

From Central and Western Connecticut (Waterbury, New Haven, Bridgeport, New London, Middletown, Meriden):
Take appropriate highway to Waterbury (intersection of I-84 and Route 8). Take Route 8 north to Torrington (downtown exit). In Torrington, turn left onto Route 4 west toward Goshen. In Goshen, turn right onto Route 63. After approximately 12 miles, turn left onto Route 126. Follow Route 126 to Route 7. Turn left onto Route 7 south, and follow to Route 112. Turn right onto Route 112. Follow Route 112 to intersection with Route 41. Go straight through blinking light. The school entrance is 100 yards on the right.

From South Western Connecticut (Greenwich, Darien, Stamford):
Take I-287 to I-684 North. Take I-684 north until it becomes Route 22 north in Brewster, NY. Follow Route 22 to Amenia, New York. At the traffic light in Amenia, turn right onto Route 343. Follow Route 343 to Sharon, Connecticut. In Sharon, at the four-way stop facing a stone clock tower, turn left onto Route 41. Follow to the intersection with Route 112 with a four-way stop (about 5 miles). Turn left onto Route 112. The school entrance is 100 yards on the right.

From the West

From Albany and Upstate New York:
Follow I-87 to intersection with I-90. Take I-90 east. Stay on I-90, following signs for Massachusetts Turnpike. Before crossing Massachusetts state line, take Exit B3 to Route 22 south. Follow Route 22 to Millerton, New York. At the stoplight in Millerton, turn left onto Route 44. Follow Route 44 through Millerton and across state line into Connecticut. Turn right onto Route 112. Follow Route 112 through a four-way stop and up hill to the school entrance on left.


From I-287 and Tappan Zee Bridge:
Take exit for the Saw Mill Parkway north. Follow parkway until you reach intersection with I-684. Take I-684 north until it becomes Route 22 north in Brewster, NY. Follow Route 22 to Amenia, New York. At the traffic light in Amenia, turn right onto Route 343. Follow Route 343 to Sharon, Connecticut. In Sharon, at the four-way stop facing a stone clock tower, turn left onto Route 41. Follow to the intersection with Route 112 with a four-way stop (about 5 miles). Turn left onto Route 112. The school entrance is 100 yards on the right.

From I-84 (Newburgh):
Cross the Hudson River on I-84 and follow to intersection with Taconic Parkway. Take the Taconic to the Route 44 and Millbrook exit. In Amenia, go straight through the one traffic light onto Route 343. Follow Route 343 to Sharon, CT. In Sharon, at the four-way stop facing a stone clock tower, turn left onto Route 41. Follow to the intersection with Route 112 with a four-way stop (about 5 miles). Turn left onto Route 112. The school entrance is 100 yards on the right.