A private boarding school in rural western Massachusetts that opened in the 19th century is receiving a $50 million bequest from a graduate and former Board of Trustees member who wanted to see his school continue to grow.
Tucked away in Franklin County, only a few miles from the state line with Vermont and New Hampshire, Northfield Mount Hermon offers scenic views of surrounding forests, the mountains and the school grounds itself.
Founded by evangelist Dwight Lyman Moody in the late 19th century, the school in Gill is home to about 630 students, with 84 percent boarding at the nearly 1,350-acre campus.
That includes fields and forests, complete with farms, greenhouses and sugar and cider houses – all part of a long-running mission to educate “the head, heart, and hands” of its students.
That mission is getting a big boost from the late John Mitchell, a longtime supporter and Pfizer Global Manufacturing executive.
“… then he goes and has this, certainly, very celebrated academic career here, in Yale and NYU. Has this impressive career at Pfizer, rising up to nearly the highest levels at Pfizer… and then, he's kind of at the mountaintop, and so, [asking] ‘What am I going to do?’ He turns his attention, really focusing, serving on our board, giving of himself, in really pretty significant ways, and just his time and his energy as a member of our trustees, and then starts to move his financial resources, and then ultimately - making that decision, looking in the mirror and saying, ‘How can I have the greatest impact at this school?’” Head of School Brian Hargrove told WAMC.
Mitchell’s credited with leading the operation of some 81 plants and 36 logistics centers for PGM, including its 35,000 employees. According to his obituary, as president, he guided the company through major acquisitions and expansions, while emphasizing product quality.
He died in 2022, and as a member of the class of ’56 and former NMH Board of Trustee, he designated $50 million for the school – the biggest gift in its history. It was so large, the school set a new goal for its ongoing fundraising campaign to support the campus, scholarships and more - upping it from $225 million to $275. They're about 84 percent there.
Hargrove says the gift speaks not just to Mitchell’s character, but also that of many of the school’s alumni. Thousands have come through the campus, which nowadays offers around 160 courses for grades 9-12, in addition to a postgraduate year.
Science Department Chair Nhu Gonzalez Hoang says compared to her time teaching in public school, NMH goes heavy on hands-on learning.
“There's this call for us to dig deep into the content if it makes sense, and think … find ways to incorporate hands on learning, to incorporate inquiry-driven, student centric work, like what interests students - we can pause, we can take a look and dive right in,” Hoang said.
That applies across departments. Loubna Boumghait is the school’s interim associate dean of students and also a member of the English faculty.
“We take those texts and students discover some things apart about their lives that they weren't familiar with or they didn't know they could do - analyzing characters, it's very discussion-based,” Boumghait said. “Most of our classes are discussion-based, e're not teaching grammar for the whole 70-75 minute class.”
Then there’s offerings like the school’s “Farm Semester” program, which sees students take on classwork and farm work – balancing agriculture and tending to animals with English and science courses.
Maeve, a senior and local student, says she planted and harvested spinach that ended up in dining hall meals – all while studying concepts like the social justice aspects of agriculture.
“It's something I've always been interested in, because I grew up on a farm, so I have a lot of experience with that, but it … brought together the science and the … people and social justice aspects of agriculture and environmentalism, which was really cool and definitely influenced what I want to do in college,” she said.
A fellow senior, Maggie, opted for a path more focused on psychology – picking up advanced coursework while also taking advantage of international offerings – traveling with a group of students to Brazil while in 10th grade.
“… to immerse yourself in the Brazilian culture and … the experiences … I would never be able to experience - going out of the country to Brazil, and the different courses that you’re able to take here are they’re not accessible, I would say, in some of the public schools around here, so just being able to experience new courses and then meeting people from all around the world is really incredible,” she told WAMC.
NMH hosts a number of international students. About a quarter are from outside the U.S., from around 60 countries.
It’s a student body that also takes advantage of financial aid – tuition, room and board is about $75,000, or about $50,000 if you’re a “Day student,” paying for tuition alone.
About a third of the student body received need-based scholarships over the past year, the sites says, totaling more than $12 million.
The average need-based scholarship awards were over $56,000 for boarding students and over $34,000 for day students.
According to Hargrove, the amount of aid harkens back to the school’s founder, who sought to build a school devoted to educating youth with limited access to education. The mission remains the same over a century later: to elevate all of those who enroll.
“That is our DNA - our DNA is to be a place that offers this tremendous academic program," he said. "[It] really helps to develop the whole person, but make sure that as we're doing that, that we really reflect the diversity in this country and around the world, because we know that strengthens our educational outcomes.”
