Ben wore slacks and a blazer to his Putney School interview because he'd worn slacks and a blazer to his other high school interviews. He did not bring his mountain bike to the other interviews.

"Yes, I actually worked out with the mountain biking team at Putney on my interview day. I also sat in on several classes, one of which was taught by a competitive road cyclist and triathlete who is also a phenomenal English teacher. Sports at Putney are everything I ever wanted from high school with none of the social muck that usually goes along with the sports scene. For that matter, even English is all I ever wanted, with no muck."

Ben grew up in Durham, Maine (near Portland) and went to a small elementary school. He was used to intimate class sizes and lots of classroom discussion. Putney offered Ben more of the same with an added level of interest and sophistication.

No grades? "Kind of. One of Putney's founding principles is that, 'We work not for marks, badges, or honors but to discover truth and grow in knowledge of the universe and in the understanding of men, to treasure the hard stretching of oneself, to render service.' We actually do get grades at Putney because colleges insist on seeing high school grades. But we don't learn what our grades are until the second semester of our junior year, when we need to see them in order to make college choices.

"It's odd, I suppose, to get grades but not be told what they are. Still, it's been nice for me as a freshman and sophomore not to have to hear over and over from classmates, 'What did you get? What did you get?' Unless two people have the same grade, comparing grades always ends badly for one of them. We do get detailed, written comments from each teacher at the end of each marking period. So, absolutely, we know whether we're excelling or whether our work needs improvement."