Monkton Prep School Wins Supporting Junior Boarders Award at BSA’s 60th Anniversary

We are delighted to share that Monkton Prep School has won the Supporting Junior Boarders Award at the 60th Anniversary of the BSA’s Supporting Excellence Awards, celebrating the outstanding dedication of its boarding community.

The award recognises the innovative and research-led approach taken to boarding induction at Monkton Prep.

The award submission highlighted the following:

Sarah Winfield, houseparent at Monkton Prep School, studied boarding induction for her BSA Boarding Leadership Diploma action research project. 

Key findings included: 

• The importance of emotional preparation for the whole family to create a successful transition to boarding.
• The need for this to begin significantly before boarding begins, and to continue long after the child arrives, for both child and parents. 

Sarah has worked with the Pastoral team to reimagine Monkton Prep’s approach to boarding induction:

• Rather than a one-off boarding taster, prospective pupils are encouraged to join multiple “Be a Boarder” events throughout the year, free of charge, for families at every stage of considering boarding (whether or not they have registered to come to Monkton). For international families, the team creates video opportunities to meet current boarders. These strategies enable the child to build relationships and become familiar with the boarding environment before they arrive.
• Houseparents schedule a one-hour video call with each new family to understand the child and the family, discussing everything from family activities and routines to family values and aspirations. They get to know the child, not just their interests, but their character, what they need when they are stressed, how they celebrate and what will make boarding a success for them as a family. This is prioritised ahead of sharing information from the school, but there is plenty of space for the family’s questions.
• Monkton Prep’s boarding handbook has been redesigned to become more child-friendly and to incorporate what boarding will feel like.

Once a pupil begins boarding, support continues both for pupil and parents.

• Every new boarder has a current Prep buddy for the first year, who writes to them before they arrive, and helps them orientate: finding classrooms, clubs, introducing them to key people, navigating meals, laundry, and taking them to informal chats with pastoral leads, and crucially, continuing to support them for the whole year, not just the first few weeks. 
• Each Prep boarder now has a Monkton Senior pupil mentor, who meets them weekly over supper, chatting through their highs, lows and everything in between.
• To deepen the links between staff and parents, and enable boarding parents to meet each other, there is a termly boarding family event, each with a different focus:

In October, families share a meal with staff and each other, followed by a quiz run by the Year 8s. 

In February, the boarding parent catch up provides space to raise issues and discuss developments with the boarding team. Birmingham University researchers plan to attend this next year. 

In June all current boarding and new joiners are invited to Afternoon Tea and a giant waterslide, forming part of both the pre and post arrival support.

As a result, Sarah Winfield was invited by the SCiP Alliance to speak at their annual conference and to join Anderson Education’s think tank to create a Boarding Thriving Lives handbook for families nationwide. Boarding at Monkton Prep has grown hugely under her leadership and she has made a huge impact on both pupils and their families.