What 70s Boarding Schools Were Really Like, and Why It Still Matters for Parents
The dormitory had twelve iron beds in a neat row, each one covered with the same thin grey blanket. I was eleven, standing at the foot of mine, trying to remember which suitcase held my pyjamas, while a woman in a starched blue dress called Matron told us to put our shoes outside the door before bed. The floor smelled of polish and years of rain. The windows were open just a crack, letting in October air that carried the sound of a faraway train. My parents had left half an hour earlier, and I had not cried yet, but my throat was doing that hard, dry thing that makes it hard to swallow.
That was 1974, my first term at a boarding school in the south of England. When people ask me what those schools were like, I usually describe the small stuff first: the butter ration at breakfast, the way we folded our clothes into three precise piles, the prefect who walked the corridor at night with a torch, checking for whispering. The rules were everywhere and they were absolute. You did not talk at the table until the master finished his toast. You did not walk on the grass. You did not put your hands in your pockets when addressing a teacher. There was a right way to hold a knife, a right way to hang a towel, a right way to make a bed so tight a coin would bounce.
Looking back, I see that the system was not cruel in any dramatic way. There was food, heating, and decent teaching. Nobody starved or froze. But there was a quiet sameness to every day, and the structure was so complete that you did not have to make many decisions for yourself. You woke at seven to a bell, washed in cold water, walked to chapel, ate porridge that had skin on it, and went to lessons. The routine was so predictable that you could float through entire weeks without thinking hard about what would happen next. That, I think, was the point.
In a strange way, the routine did help some boys. I remember a quiet kid named Richard who arrived two weeks late, after his father had died. He did not talk much, but he never got lost between lessons. The schedule carried him. He knew where to go and what to expect, and even when he was sad, he could put one foot in front of the other because the timetable told him to. The school did not offer counselling or conversation; it offered clear expectations and a full diary. That was its answer to grief. It was not warm, but it was something.
I also remember boys who could not take the sameness. They broke rules just to feel something—one boy kept stealing biscuits from the pantry, not because he was hungry, but because he liked the small thrill of doing something forbidden. He got six strokes of a cane and stood very straight during it, which was the only way to survive. Afterwards, the master told him he was lucky. I have often thought about that phrase. Lucky. The school believed that discipline was a kindness, that the cane was a way of wiping the slate clean. Many parents believed it too. They sent their sons letters that said Keep your chin up, do your best, and remember who you are. The letters were always a little formal. They did not ask what we were feeling. They asked about marks and rugby.
Years later, when my own children were small, I found myself drifting back to those mornings. Not the lessons, but the small rituals: the silver sugar bowl always in the same place, the sound of chairs scraping after grace, the way Matron checked our fingernails every Friday. At the time, I thought I hated it. Then, as a father, I understood something odd: my children wanted routine too. My son, at four, would only eat toast if I cut it into triangles, and only if the triangles were placed on the plate the same way every time. It drove me mad. But then I saw how his shoulders lowered when the pattern was right. The predictability was not just annoying; it was calming. It told him that the world was ordered and safe.
The problem with 1970s boarding schools was not the structured days. It was that the structure replaced emotional connection instead of supporting it. The routine kept us safe, but there was no one saying, “Let’s sit down and let you tell me what you miss.” The masters saw their job as turning boys into resilient adults. They assumed that not mentioning homesickness would make it go away. Sometimes it did. Often it just went underground. When I got a fever in November, I lay in the infirmary and stared at a crack in the ceiling for two days. The nurse gave me aspirin and took my temperature. She did not ask if I was lonely. If she had asked, I would not have known what to say.
As a teacher now, I think about that gap. The practical lesson I carry with me is this: routine and connection are not opposites, but they have to be balanced. At school, I always meet new children at the classroom door in the first week. I say their names out loud. I make sure I know something about them by Thursday—a dog, a football team, a fear of spiders. That is not therapy. It is just noticing. And I try to make space for the messy bits of a day within the structure. The timetable stays, but my phrase is simple: “Before we start, is there anything that needs saying out loud?” Sometimes there is. Usually it’s about lost homework. But once, a boy looked at his shoes and said, “My mum’s in hospital.” We sat quietly for a moment, and then I asked if he wanted to tell the class or keep it to himself. He chose to keep it. I wrote a note in my head to check on him at break. That is the part the boarding school missed. It had the structure, but it did not have that moment.
For parents, I think the lesson is smaller and more practical. You do not have to leave your child to learn resilience. You just have to be there in small, predictable ways when the day has been hard. A set bedtime is good. A special phrase at drop-off is better. My daughter and I had one: she would press her thumb against my palm, and I would tap her knuckle twice—a tiny secret code that meant I will see you soon. It took three seconds. But it was our ritual inside the bigger ritual of school, a small pocket of connection that made the routine bearable. That is what many children in those old boarding schools were missing. They had the bell, the bed, the rules. They had a routine that kept them upright. But they did not have a palm to press their thumb into.
I have been back to my old school once since then, and the corridors look smaller. The dormitory is now a study room with laptops on the desks. They still have a routine, but there is a counsellor now, and the prefects are called peer mentors. On the wall there is a poster about talking about your feelings. It feels right, although I do not know exactly what those twelve iron beds would make of it. Perhaps they would just be glad that the windows are still open a crack, letting in the air. I know I am.
Please indicate: Thinking In Educating » What 70s Boarding Schools Were Really Like, and Why It Still Matters for Parents