"St. Johnsbury Academy is different from most other independent highschools. It is 'an old New England academy,' a high school established long before public high schools were established and one that has always received otherwise public school students. The following "Conversation with the Headmaster" explains the most important differences between St. Johnsbury Academy and other independent high schools."

Mr. Mayo, you have been associated with the Academy as student, teacher, and headmaster since 1952. How would you describe St. Johnsbury Academy?

There are two ways to answer that question. One of them is quite predictable. The Academy is a secondary institution dedicated to providing a superior education to a community of students whose interests and abilities span the full intellectual spectrum. That answer, while true, is formal and cold. The other way is to speak to the question of what the Academy means to itself and to the students, teachers, and parents who make up the Academy community. Quite simply, the Academy is a warm and caring place where 900 students of very different kinds of ability and experience are the focus of nearly 100 professional people's best efforts to give them what they need educationally to go on to the next step in their lives. The Academy has been doing business on this same spot for over 150 years. Despite that long passage of time, it has remained spiritually young and vibrantly responsive to the need of its students to make their way into the greater world firmly grounded in a relevant and useful education. The pride of our students in this school and the loyalty of our more than 10,000 alumni almost always surprise those who do not yet know the Academy well. A small measure of that is the fact that, last June, more than 600 people returned for the Alumni Banquet, some of them celebrating their seventy-fifth reunion.

Many of the students at St. Johnsbury Academy come from the local area. Often their tuition has been paid by the community in which they live. To some this suggests that the Academy is in some way a public school. Is that so?

The Academy is not a public school. It is an independent school in all respects from its governance through every facet of its operation. However, it is in the unique position of receiving day students who otherwise would attend public schools if they did not seek and gain admission to the Academy. The Academy was founded in 1842 by a philanthropic family whose intention was to provide an education that would span the middle ground between elementary school and college, what we now know as secondary education. From the beginning, the Academy has been operated by a self-perpetuating board of trustees who authorize the administration to receive qualified students from more than a dozen towns of northeastern Vermont and northwestern New Hampshire. At that time, there were no public schools anywhere in northern Vermont or New Hampshire. About thirty years later, in the 1870s, the public secondary school initiative took hold, and public high schools were established all across the country. In this part of New England, almost universally, towns, rather than build their own schools, chose to tuition their students to whatever private schools would accept them. In other words, otherwise public school students who successfully gained admission to private schools like the Academy paid for it with vouchers that were later redeemed by the public authorities of the towns from which the students came. For 150 years, we have operated a true voucher system, one in which our school remains entirely independent, yet serves a stable and sizeable population of day students whose tuition is paid by voucher.

What are the advantages that accrue to the Academy and its students through this voucher system?

We have the best of both worlds. We have an entirely independent school that can and does provide a superior education to its clientele without interference from well-meaning, but bothersome public bureaucracies, yet we have the advantages of a large enough student body to provide a comprehensive curriculum that goes beyond the college preparatory curriculum typical of independent schools. As an independent school, we are able to state our philosophy and pursue our goals and objectives free of public interference. As the preferred school of so many students, we have ample resources to provide the best teachers and state-of-the-art equipment to guarantee our students quality time and quality opportunities to pursue their educational goals.

You said the Academy offers a much broader curriculum than one would expect. Most independent schools have elected to serve a homogeneous constituency. Is there a philosophical basis for the Academy's comprehensive curriculum?

Our charter states simply that we exist to serve the educational needs of young people. From the very beginning, the Academy has understood that many young people will not go on to college, but will need vocational or technical training of one kind or another to survive economically in the workplace. From the beginning, too, we have acknowledged that students' abilities range across the whole intellectual spectrum. More important, we have accepted the responsibility for educating all of the students who successfully seek admission to the Academy, not just those bound for college. Thus, we have always had vocational and technical programs, and we have always offered academic instruction in homogeneous groups at different ability levels. Our philosophy commits us to the practice; our large student population supplies the economy of scale that makes so many class sections possible. Most other independent schools are either philosophically committed to a college preparatory curriculum or too small to offer a comprehensive curriculum.

What about the day students? Specifically, what advantages are there for a boarding student at the Academy, where there is a large day student population?

We do have a large day school population, but we have a very sizeable resident student population, too. We have 750 day students and 150 resident students. Throughout the day, the two populations are virtually indistinguishable. On afternoons and weekends, we provide a very full program of supervised study and activities for our resident students. Their numbers are quite large enough to provide them an identity and a dynamic independent of their day school counterparts.

More important, the Academy has always philosophically been committed to a mix of day and boarding students. On December 13, 1842, twenty-three students started their studies at the Academy on the first day of its existence. Three of those were boarding students. Every year since we have had boarding students in attendance at the Academy.

We believe that the presence of students from other states and countries is of great value to our Vermont and New Hampshire students. They bring a frame of reference, a sophistication, a range of experience that help our students lose their fear of the greater world. Conversely, those students who come here from other states and foreign places have the advantage of coming to know first-hand a stable community that espouses traditional values and where it is quite common to find that their colleagues' parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents have all graduated from the Academy. There is an interchange of information, experiences, and attitudes that is of significant benefit to both resident students and day students. This year we have 150 residents from nineteen states and seventeen foreign countries, ranging from Germany right