Bridgedale Academy - Believe in Your Son

Is your goal to maximize your son’s development as a student, as an athlete, and as a young man? Do you want to give him the very best chance to realize his full human potential? Bridgedale Academy answers the bell on all counts.

Academics:

1) Bridgedale Academy offers a "classical school education." This is the type of education that families spend upwards of $50,000 per year at some boarding schools to get. It is also the type of education that for literally centuries has been provided to the "upper crust" of society.

2) Compared to schools that follow the Common Core (i.e. which is all public and Catholic schools in Illinois), well ... there is no comparison. Common Core is the latest national initiative for a one-size-fits-all curriculum - it is a boondoggle and a national tragedy in the making.

3) The schools of America's government-run education system (euphemistcally called "public schools") are modeled after the Prussian Education System. We encourage you to research this. You'll find that it was intended to educate the citizenry of Prussia/Germany to prepare them for careers that would benefit the nation, while also imbuing the masses with loyalty to the Prussian state. Now, this is not altogether a bad thing, but it is indeed instructive to point out that the Prussian ruling elites sent their OWN children to private schools or tutoring so they would get a classical school education. They did this because they wanted their children to be prepared to be the nation's leaders as adults (i.e. and not merely be subjects of the state).

4) Bridgedale is not the only school around offering a proper classical education, but it is the only one that combines such an education with elite athletic development, and obviously the only one for young hockey players and golfers.

5) Every single Bridgedale student, and all the Bridgedale parents, have said that our academics are more challenging than their prior school's academics, and it doesn't matter what school they were at last year, whether private or public.

6) Despite the fact that the academics are more challenging, ALL our students say they like/love this about Bridgedale, i.e. because they are LEARNING more than they did before. There is of course homework, yet most of our students get their homework done during our after-school supervised study period.

 

Athletics:

1) These are critical years in your son’s development as an athlete, whether in golf or in hockey. Each year that goes by now in which he doesn't receive the type of athletic training we can offer him at Bridgedale is a "critical" lost opportunity.

[This first point deserves some explanation. Of the age levels that we train at Bridgedale, it is the youngest (i.e. the 10-year olds) for whom the greatest potential for the development of athleticism still exists. And it is a cold reality that no human being ever gets to somehow "repeat" next year the developmental year that he could have had this year. Sports science informs us that it just doesn't work that way. Either the young athlete has maximized the development of his athleticism during each year, or he hasn't. And so for a 13-year old, the crucial-to-their-development ages of 11 and 12 have already gone by, never to be recaptured. Sports science also confirms that this "window of opportunity" for the development of athleticism begins to close as puberty takes hold, i.e. for boys at around 15-17 years old depending on the athlete. After that, it's pretty much only a matter of developing physical strength and/or "honing" an existing skills set (and of course gaining experience through competitions for those lucky enough to keep moving up the pyramid). But laying that foundation of general overall athleticism, upon which both hockey's and golf's skills sets are built, must come earlier.]

2) Bridgedale’s athletic training sessions comprise 2 hours of each school day, M-Th. Our student-athletes train not only for their physical skills set but also for a better conceptual understanding of how to play the game (i.e. course management in golf, game sense in hockey). And all our athletes train for the ABC's of agility, balance and coordination, as well as for strength and general athleticism.

3) Daily athletic training is extremely valuable and healthy for young boys. In our opinion, ALL schools should be offering as much athletic training as Bridgedale Academy does. Boys are boys and have "little boy energy" that absolutely NEEDS an outlet. And it is the stronger, more competitive athletes among the boys who need that outlet the most. But this last point notwithstanding, it is now our belief, and our contention, that ALL boys should get as much daily exercise AT SCHOOL as we provide at Bridgedale. Yet virtually none do.

4) All else being equal, Bridgedale's student-athletes are more energized, more alert, stronger, more focused, and have greater *stamina (and therefore less inclined to be fatigued) than other boys their age. Despite (or perhaps because of) the almost military-like regimen that Bridgedale student-athletes keep in their daily lives, we virtually never have kids who are yawning or can't keep their eyes open in class. 

[*This point about stamina is also true in competitions. With our hockey-athletes, we have been amazed by the excellent "decision-making" that the Bridgedale boys (both AAA and AA) have demonstrated at the ends of shifts. As a rule, the very first thing that goes when an athlete becomes fatigued is his ability to think clearly. And this tends to lead to poor decisions and critical turnovers, especially late in shifts and/or late in games. This is true even at the NHL level. Yet in all the games we've watched, we have yet to see a Bridgedale boy show mental fatigue (or physical fatigue for that matter), irrespective of whether it’s late in a shift or late in a game. Not once.]

Bottom line: Every young player should have the opportunity to make the most of every school year, both academically and athletically. 

Bridgedale Academy offers them this opportunity!