Natalya Vinogradova, a math teacher and native of Russia, found the Math and Technology Conference through a search on the Internet. She had never been to the United States when she decided to attend the conference in 1999. She returned the following year for the conference and to teach in the Exeter Summer School, then stayed on to intern during the regular school year.

An Emphasis on Outreach

“Where I come from squash is a noun or a verb, not a sport,” says Joseph Bia Jr. ’01. “Everyone I knew before I came to the Summer School was a Navajo living on the reservation. In my dorm at Exeter, I met people from Europe, Asia, Africa and South America. It was an amazing experience.”

In 1999, Bia came to Exeter from Kayenta, AZ, through the oldest of the Summer School’s special programs, which provides scholarship aid to Navajo, Hopi, and White Mountain and Sans Carlos Apache Native Americans. He saw his first fireflies, went on a whale watch and visited Boston, but most of all, he discovered a new way of learning. “In my public high school on the reservation, you sit in rows of seats,” he explains. “The only students who really want to learn are in the front row, and the classes are geared towards those students. At Exeter, the kids teach each other around the Harkness table. It’s a completely different atmosphere.”

Bia was so impressed by his summer at Exeter, he enrolled in the regular session in the fall of 2000 to complete a post-graduate year. He has applied to colleges with strong premed programs and plans to go on to medical school. Eventually, he wants to return to his reservation in Arizona to work as a doctor. He adds, “We really need doctors on the Navajo reservation. I believe this is my purpose.”

Founded in 1919, the Exeter Summer School enrolls 580 students entering grades 9 through 12 or the first year of college for five weeks of intensive study in a wide variety of subjects, from drama to physics. The enrichment program is designed for motivated students who want an academic experience. Because Summer School does not grant credit, the focus is on learning for the sake of learning. The first program at Exeter to employ female faculty and to enroll female students, the Summer School operates independently of the regular session and draws its instructors from public and private schools around the country in addition to making use of Exeter faculty.

Math instructor Richard “Hobart” Hardej, who has directed the Summer School for the past six years, says, “Each session welcomes approximately 600 students, most of whom didn’t even know Exeter existed before their arrival—almost twice the number of new students who matriculate to regular session each fall. Through this outreach, we are extending Exeter’s concept of residential education to increasing numbers of communities that wouldn’t otherwise know much about us.”

Outreach is the key word here. Under Hardej’s direction, the Summer School has expanded the Native American program and intensified recruitment efforts aimed at disadvantaged students. Working with Memphis Partners, a volunteer group affiliated with public schools in Memphis, TN, Exeter recruits and provides aid for roughly 20 students from the city’s schools each summer. In 1998, Summer School initiated a new program for six students from public schools in Jackson, MS; this past summer, generous support from an alumnus enabled 10 Jackson students to enroll. Exeter alumni provide important leadership that adds new focus to summer recruitment efforts, says Hardej, citing the Exeter Association of Washington, which has dramatically increased Summer School representation from Seattle, as another notable example. Alumni have also been instrumental in increasing participation from Kentucky, Massachusetts and Texas. Hardej has also established the Maine Scholars Program to bring gifted and talented students from Maine to Exeter, many on scholarship, as well as the Joshua Chamberlain Leadership Scholar Program in partnership with Bowdoin College. In 2000, six students of color accepted to Bowdoin attended Exeter to gain postgraduate experience in college-level writing and seminar-style classes, as well as to help develop the independence required to live away from home.

Aiydah Bashir was one of the Chamberlain Scholars who attended Summer School last year. A public school student from Queens, NY, she says, “I had never been away from home for more than a week before. Being at Exeter loosened me up and got me used to speaking in class more. Students led the classes. That’s the way it is in college, too.”

A freshman majoring in sociology with an education minor, Aiydah plans to become an elementary education teacher. She notes that the summer spent at Exeter made a real difference in preparing her for the small classes at Bowdoin. She made a difference by starting a step dance team at Summer School which performed at the final dance assembly. She has initiated a similar venture at Bowdoin, recruiting 22 students to participate in a new step team there.

Aiydah hopes to return to the Summer School to work as an intern during her college years. The intern program brings college students to assist with teaching under the direction of experienced faculty and to live in the dorms. Last year, five interns came from the Republic of Georgia, in the former Soviet Union. They plan to start their own school in Georgia using the Harkness approach. Countless other summer interns have gone on to complete advanced degrees and teach in public and private schools.

Building on a Legacy

English instructor Doug Rogers will take over as director of the Summer School this year. He notes, “Hobart’s legacy is the financial aid budget, which he has really built. It’s over $425,000 a year now. You can touch a lot of lives with that kind of money.”

For the past two decades, Summer School has attracted a diverse range of international students, but intensified recruitment efforts in the United States have made the composition of the student body even more diverse. Students of color now constitute approximately 50 percent of the student body. Summer School regularly enrolls teenagers from roughly 40 states and 35 foreign countries. As Joseph Bia puts it, recalling his delight at encountering people from so many places, “The world is represented at Exeter.”

Under Doug Rogers’ leadership, Summer School will continue to modify the composition of the school and its academic offerings. Beginning in the summer of 2002, ACCESS EXETER will offer an accelerated program of study in the arts and sciences, courses designed for students entering grades seven, eight and nine. The total enrollment of the Summer School will be approximately 580 students, but 120 of them will be middle-school students, 80 of whom will live on campus (the remaining 40 will be day students from the greater seacoast area).

“I’ve always thought we should think of ourselves as a 12-month institution, not a nine-month,” Rogers says of Exeter’s efforts to assist a broad spectrum of students in the summer. “To reach kids earlier will help instill greater possibilities for future success.”

In recent years, a number of Summer School graduates who have come through the Memphis and Jackson programs have gone on to enroll at Ivy League colleges. Of 40 students cited as the top African-American high school students in the country by Ebony magazine this year, two were Summer School graduates. Hobart Hardej says many of these students never would have considered applying to a college out of state before coming to Exeter. “Our mission,” he says, “is to extend the Exeter experience to a population of students who wouldn’t have the opportunity otherwise. It’s a thrill to see these students thrive here for a summer and go on to do so well.”

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