The Dexter School

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Dexter is divided into a Lower School for grades K-6, Middle School for grades 7-8, and an Upper School for grades 9-12.

Life on the Dexter campus reflects a student body which is friendly and respectful. School life is characterized by a commitment to academic excellence, a competitive spirit on the athletic fields, and a desire to contribute positively to the school family as well as the extended community. Faculty members are not only teachers but coaches, mentors, bus drivers, and advisers. Each student feels supported by a network of concerned and helpful adults. Boys and girls are not the same. Considerable research and scientific study indicate that the pace of development differs by gender, affecting learning styles and classroom dynamics. Author-educator Robert Kennedy explains, “Educating boys and girls in single sex settings is not an assault on equal rights. It is an opportunity which ultimately will enhance equality by allowing boys and girls to develop their own unique characters.”

Dexter is a boys’ day school. The School cultivates an atmosphere in which boys develop a sense of purpose, camaraderie, and gentlemanly conduct. Students adhere to the principles of sound social, moral, and spiritual attitudes, habits, appreciations, and ideals. Outsiders often remark that a Dexter boy makes eye contact, speaks respectfully, and offers a firm handshake.

Since 1926, Dexter School has been educating boys in a single gender setting where they are free to create, laugh at themselves, compete, and achieve without worrying about how they appear to others in a coed environment. The men and women of the faculty know boys well. The classroom environment avoids gender stereotypes and social pressures, enabling boys to be comfortable as boys. Art and music, athletics, creative thinking, and hard work are activities in which students can be engaged without concern for unnecessary distractions or social predjudices.