Why Friends? Student FAQs

Most students (and their parents) say that Friends is a pretty easy place to be new. There are some official programs built in to help – like student guides and advisory groups in middle school, and the upper school Link Crew students who help new kids and freshmen throughout their first year. Lower school grades are smaller than middle and upper school, and new students come to Friends in every grade, except maybe senior year.

But an even more important reason that it's easy to be new at Friends is that this is a Quaker school; and even though that's not always an influence that people identify for what happens here, it is a very real influence. People at Friends are just pretty good to each other (with some occasional exceptions, of course), and the standards for how you treat other people are as high as the standards for academics. Plus, the kids who have been here the longest are usually the most excited about new people coming in, especially if they have an interest in common.

You can get a pretty good feel for how Friends students welcome new people when you visit for a day.

Friends is hard but not mean. The teachers here want students to do well, and they will work hard to help you. They don’t try to bury you with homework just to do it (although it can pile up at times, especially if you don’t plan ahead).

But teachers here do expect you to speak up in class, to do a lot of different kinds of projects and labs, to read and write a lot, to use technology, to make original arguments, to revise almost everything, to respond to what other people do, to work in different groups, etc. They expect you to do the best you can with every assignment and will call you on it if you don’t.

There are some upper school classes that are hard enough that you should think about them carefully before signing up. But when students find Friends “hard,” especially at first, it’s usually because they’re used to classes that require mostly memorization or one kind of assignment. The classes here require a lot of analysis, a lot of saying why something is true or why you think it is, and a lot of variety in assignments. That can be hard if you’re not used to it, again, especially at first.

Friends has competitive, interscholastic sports starting in seventh grade, and sports are taken seriously. There are great facilities, including a training room and full-time trainer. Most coaches are Friends teachers or have a lot of outside experience (like coaching in leagues); they even give report cards (pass-fail with comments) in sports.

In middle school, everybody has to play a sport every season. It’s part of trying everything in middle school. One good thing is that a lot of people discover that they like a sport they had never tried before--and they keep playing in upper school. Another good thing is that you learn to play with teammates of different strengths, and you develop some good skills that way (whether you are a strong player or there because you have to be), just like working with different groups of people in class. Middle school sports also usually have different levels, A and B (and sometimes C) teams, so you can play where you should play. All of the teams are instructional but play to win, especially at the A level.

Varsity and JV sports in upper school are competitive. Friends tries not to cut, so usually every student who’s interested can be on the team, but not everybody gets to play in every competition. The teams play to win. Upper school students are required to play at least one sport each year (with one non-interscholastic option, a fitness program); most Friends students play more than one sport. A lot of Friends graduates play varsity sports in college—usually 10-20% of each graduating class.

If you have an interest in a particular sport, the admissions office can help arrange a meeting or phone call with the varsity coach, so you can get a sense of what your sport is like at Friends.

There are two main beliefs from Quakerism that you see in practice in Quaker schools.

One is the idea that truth isn’t fixed and permanent; you have to keep looking for it, testing it against experience and new ideas and questions. That’s kind of what you’ll be asked to do in your classes here—not just memorize, but ask questions and try new ideas. You always have to keep learning, and so do the adults.

The second belief is that there is “that of God” in everyone. Whether you think in terms of “God” or just goodness or dignity, there’s this idea that each person has a fundamental worth that you have to respect and support. You are expected to develop the best of your own talents to your full potential, and also to bring out the best in the people around you. Everything that happens at Friends supports that kind of thinking and that way of acting toward other people.

People often say that Friends graduates are confident but not arrogant, that the school gives students a sense that you’re not better than anybody else and nobody else is better than you.

That kind of equality is what you see in Meeting for Worship, which is held once a week for students and teachers. In schools, Meeting for Worship is less a religious practice than a time for quiet reflection. The group gathers in silence, and anyone who wants to speak can stand and share a brief message. A kid in preschool has as much right to speak as the Head of School; all voices are valued equally—respecting that fundamental dignity in each person. While people are in school as students, they have some mixed feelings about Meeting for Worship—some kids love it; some think it’s boring—but almost all Friends graduates say, looking back, that they deeply value the experience of Meeting for Worship and often go back to the practice of a “moment of silence” when they need it.

The admissions office can answer a lot of questions, and the staff there can also put you in touch with a student if you like. When you visit Friends, you’ll have a student guide for the day, and you can ask that person a lot of questions, too. And you should ask about everything that’s important to you, because you won't have a chance to see it all in action. Friends has a lot to offer--to students with all kinds of interests and talents.

 

To contact the admissions office, email admissions@wilmingtonfriends.org, or call 302.576.2930.