Just as the name suggests, boarding is a crucial part of a student’s life at the “Family Boarding School”. A dormitory is not only a place where students sleep but also a second home for students where they learn about cultures from around the world, gain important life skills, and form lifelong friendships. To help foster this development, student and faculty housing assignments are carefully chosen each school year.   

The Hill School’s Housing Committee, currently co-chaired by Laura McConney, Director of Residential Life, and Jason VonWachenfeldt, Dean of Faculty, is responsible for these selections. When deciding on faculty housing accommodations, the committee looks to ensure that the needs of the school are met, while also keeping in mind the preferences of the individual faculty members. They discuss a faculty member’s seniority, or time spent at The Hill School, including their total time spent living in dorms, as well as family needs.  

“We have the ability here to house like 99 percent of the faculty, so all of our housing is on campus,” McConney mentioned, which reinforces the family bonding aspect of boarding life at The Hill School. Faculty can form relationships with students through the role of dorm parent or if they want to further deepen their connections with a wide range of students. They may also be a dorm affiliate, who is a faculty member who does not live in a dorm, but has evening duties in an assigned dormitory, such as checking in and interacting with students until lights out. 

In order to take on these roles, faculty members informally volunteer for these positions by expressing their want for a change in their accommodation. The housing committee takes the same factors into consideration when deciding these faculty’s accommodations, in addition to experience and tenure. Choosing the right dorm parent allows a dorm’s residents to feel fully comfortable in their “home away from home”.    

Of course, students’ assignments are equally as important as those of the faculty, so changes are often made to student accommodations to better fit their needs and the needs of the school. Students are asked their preferences through a survey, and the Housing Committee aims to meet those preferences whenever and wherever possible. The main goal of this process of deciding housing accommodations is to further a student’s ability to form friendships with people who they might not ordinarily cross paths with. Kara Finley ’26 explained, “I like the social aspect of dorm life because it helps me to form close relationships with people in my grade as well as my prefects.” Finding the right match for each student allows the “family” aspect of boarding life to flourish.