School life, between the linesBy Admissions Diary
School stories, admissions adventures, and the things parents talk about on the way home.
School portraits · Washington, DC
Every few years, Maret's teachers secretly rehearse a surprise assembly. The 2023 school magazine told the history, from a motorcycle in 1997 to a head of school on a wire, spinning.
School portraits · San Jose, California
The 2016 spirit rally in San Jose was held in a downpour, and the third graders had questions. Five years earlier, the seniors had won hearts by screaming in total silence.
School portraits · Brooklyn
Every December, Upper Schoolers at a Brooklyn school play Spoon Games, a two-week hunt with plastic cutlery. One senior filed a dispatch from the front.
School portraits · New York City
Chess Life visited a Manhattan school's Monday beginners' group in 2025. The coach taught a pin, and then the villain's laugh to go with it.
School portraits · Seattle
An entrepreneurship class in Seattle hands out two dollars and asks students to grow its value. The results range from gum to a record to a rumor.
School portraits · Atlanta
Eight Atlanta students learned swing dance during their January term and planned to spring it on the lunchroom. A flash mob depends on surprise, and on audio.
School portraits · Brooklyn
A Brooklyn school runs scavenger hunts for new teachers and for eighth graders. One of them went to a baseball game instead.
School portraits · Houston
In February 2017, two St. John's School students in Houston kept an hour-by-hour diary of tech week for the musical Curtains. At 5 p.m. one of them had her hair done by her algebra teacher, and seized the moment.
School portraits · Chicago
At the 2024 Illinois state math contest, two Latin School of Chicago students made a small mistake and assumed they'd lost. By third place they weren't listening. They had won.
School portraits · Brooklyn
Two Poly Prep seniors wanted a bigger turnout for their February food packing day in Brooklyn, so they recruited the football team using its points system. The bags got packed. The second half of the plan needed work.
School portraits · Seattle
In fall 2025, the Bush School's girls' basketball program in Seattle was nearly out of players. Two seniors and their coach wrote a case for changing a rule. On the first day of the season, 21 showed up.
School portraits · San Francisco
In a Lick-Wilmerding class called Rethinking Furniture, a sophomore designed a lounge chair based on a geodesic dome. Then his computer crashed.
