My 16 year old son and I came on a hot day in August 2022 for the 10:00am information session and…read more11:15am campus tour. This is a top-notch small liberal arts college (about 1,800 students come from 49 states and other countries) with a gorgeous campus. The hilltop view of the Connecticut River in the distance is worth the visit! The campus has a nice mix of architectural styles with a world-class natural history museum. Afterwards, getting lunch in the town of Amherst was convenient - the proximity of restaurants in town within walking distance is a plus for Amherst students. Amherst still requires KN95 mask wearing for indoor building access and requires you to show your COVID-19 vaccination card. If you don't like this policy, that may be a sign that Amherst College is not for you. In any case, it's well worth a stop here if you're looking at small liberal arts colleges. One star is removed for not having a short restroom break during the tour. Also, the information session auditorium was difficult to find and about a 10 minute walk from the admissions office.

What a beautiful campus!!! This is rated among the top three liberal arts college on the national…read morelevel! This College was a lot better than I expected.I went to an information session and campus tour to learn about the college for my daughter. What I learned was that they have an open curriculum and they focus on undergraduate studies and accept a student body of 1800. Their financial aid is based not on a merit system it's based on finances. The campus has newly built science center and they have the most incredible Beniski Natural Sciencecience museum!!! I didn't have a chance to go ahead and look throughout the entire museum but this is definitely on my list to come backbut they had a huge skeleton of a mammoth and that already made me fall in love with this museum. They had a great student center which house a lot of movie nights and other cool things on campus. There ihave one dedicated food Hall of the Valentine because the person who cooks there is named Valentine... I think. And they have an amazing athletic center which a humongous track and field which is the state of the yard. They have new dorms for upperclassmen and the underclassmen resides in the center square.I definitely think it's worth visiting they also have arts museum to which I didn't have a chance to look at but again I'm on my list to visit. Also this is a very inclusive College.

Great school that both of my children attend. Hard working staff that truly care about their…read morestudents. Many extracurricular activities available besides sports teams. Plenty of parking on the high school side, however the middle school side lacks adequate parking.

My beloved Alma mater. I love this place but I do not love the chancellor. If Javier Reyes could…read moreresign instead of calling in police to drag students protesting for human rights and an end to genocide that would be great. Food isn't half bad either.

It's an university campus. Parking fee was reasonable , 1 hr was $1.50. I paid at the machine in…read morethe parking structure by the food court. Food court is sponsor by Marriot culinary program so the food looks good. Lots of the lines had 30 or more people waiting so didn't have time. School clothing store had affordable sweaters, about $36 for a UMass Champion brand hooded sweater. Nice campus.

I am the mother of a current student at the school. We have had quite the journey to find a school…read morethat is not abusive and productive for his needs. My son had attended 5 other therapeutic boarding schools prior to his start at Valley View. Many, if not all had an element of emotional or physical abuse. The industry is corrupt in so many ways, from the educational consultants who get financial kickbacks to the money-hungry owners of the for-profit schools, it really is difficult for a desperate parent to weed through the BS and find a school that actually cares about your child. VVS sets itself apart by being a not-for-profit school thus not driven by financial gain. They have proved to our family that there schools available that are truly child-centered. From the start, the school believed in my son. He wasn't just another "bad kid". Upon his arrival, he was in fact probably one of the most challenging kids at the school, but they trusted the process and supported him through it. Throughout his 1.5 years there he has grown into the young man that I could always see. The school started with getting his medicine correct. Because they have a full-time nurse they were able to monitor his behavior and report it back to the psychiatrist. They would make small adjustments to the dosage and time administered to give him the best opportunity to succeed. This then allowed his brain the opportunity to use the tools they were teaching him at VVS. I think one of the biggest differences between VVS and other therapeutic schools would be that they allow the boys to still be kids. The environment is less clinical and more supportive. It functions much like a regular boarding school with the support that kids like my son need. They have clubs, outings, and social opportunities to allow him to mature in a more natural type of environment. The staff has been so supportive of my son, so much so that his advisor takes him and other students fishing at a lake by his home and to have dinner with his family after. They interact with him much like a family member would, making him feel included all while being away from us. My son has gone from being kicked out of over 7 schools to being elected onto student council, on the honor roll, and even the school librarian; a position they created for him seeing what his strengths are. That is just what you get at VVS, they look for the good in your child and create opportunities for them to excel in that area. I can not thank them enough for the transformation they have allowed my son to make. I want to speak a bit about the negative reviews that can be found for Valley View. From what I have seen in our many years of therapeutic settings, you are dealing with students and sometimes parents with mental health needs. Often times disgruntled students that did not succeed in the program can interpret their experience as abusive. Other times they are angry that their parents "sent them away" and feel they need to seek revenge on the school. From our experience, when my son has had an issue with the staff he will let me know over the phone or facetime call. Often times when he and I talk through it we discover that he was interpreting their actions or words out of context...which is part of the reason many of the boys are there in the first place. There have been a few times that I did feel the need to bring it up with his advisor. Every time I addressed it with the lead staff, the issue has been addressed and resolved. My son has learned a lot from that process actually. He learned how to address things that make you uncomfortable, be heard, and the issue resolved. My last point I want to touch on is the price. This is a self-pay school, for most, insurance will not cover any part of it. This was the case for us. It is a huge financial investment. We have chosen to prioritize our son's future and are so happy we did. We went from being concerned that he'd ever been able to live on his own, to looking for top universities after graduation. Valley View School has given my son a chance at the life he deserves and for that, we will be forever grateful!

Before I start I want the reader to know that I was a troubled young man who absolutely made…read moreprogress at this school even though some events that happened to me are probably illegal now. These events happened 40+ years ago. I was adopted (as a baby, my adoptive parents were all I knew). So being institutionalized from them stung quite a bit. I remember being angry and confused during my first day. I had a moment so I snuck behind a shed (music and wood shop) to have a cigarette. 5 minutes in a large bald man showed up and told me to put out my cigarette. After I put it out I had a few smartass words for the man. He grabbed me by the collar and shoved me against the wall of the shed and said "You are here now!". That was day 1. I forgot this guys name, I do remember his brother taught guitar there. The next BIG thing that happened was, during my year I was having a bad day due to losing a privilege or something. I was walking by one of the Phils that ran the school. There was Phil Spiva and Phil (A-Hole). I was walking by Phil A. and again I'm sure I said something bad to him because he followed me into my "private" room then he shoved me onto my bed. He then got into my face and yelled "Your parents don't even want you anymore!" (Word for word). A very nice thing to say to a boy who was just rejected by his adoptive parents. Maybe I'm wrong for letting these past events affect me, maybe I should let it all go. So for whoever is running that place now, memories last a lifetime. Be careful of who you hire. Moving on

Williston gave me a good education and a great start in life. College was very successful, thanks…read morein part to foundation I received at Williston. After college I returned to visit Williston and met with the then Headmaster [my old one too] and I was able to fill a position on the faculty for a semester and then in the Summer School. This experience was a springboard to my Boston College Law school education, and clearly a positive element in my career and life to date. This June [2025] will be my 60th Reunion. I will go with gratitude and anticipation of seeing my friends from Williston. As our Class Agent for decades [a ceremonial chore, I assure you], I am in constant communication with guys I was in school at Williston with. We may be "old", but we are thankful for our education at Williston more than 60 years ago, and happy for the life-long friends we made.

My family has not had a good experience at Williston. The teachers seem burned out or just…read moresurviving (and are fake nice, they hide how mean/angry they are, and then when parents are around, they act like they are so nice, which they are not), the coaches are only focused on playing the top players that come to Williston already as top players, rather than working on and developing their younger/less experienced players into becoming a top player. The heads of the school are not approachable. They look like they are always in a bad mood or are mad at students. They are always inconsistent when it comes to who is disciplined, and who isn't. One kid could break a school rule and get in sent to the dean, and then another kid could do the same exact thing and never have to visit the dean. The energy behind the scenes at Williston is negative, most kids who go there do not like Williston but appreciate that their parents are spending the money to send them to a private school. It seems more like a public school with rich (not wealthy) people in it, than a private school---kind of shabby and gawdy, not traditional new england private school, like they were desperate for students and let in a bunch of thugs who maybe can throw a ball well or who own Mercedes and BMWs but live in a cul de sac in a pre-fab pop-up McMiniMansion and visit the mall weekly. I preferred the private schools I visited on the coast, much classier that Williston.

Beautiful preparatory school near Gill, MA. It has very well kept grounds. Students are well…read moreeducated.

My daughter is a sophomore and we absolutely love the school. I am sad to see the one star rating…read moreby a fellow boarding school athlete as the only review/rating show up whenever I add the location to my maps so I'm adding mine.

Graduation Day for our Niece. She's been here four years. This will be a outdoor event, 650 Grads…read more Weather in the 70's, a nice Weather day for her Special Event. 7 of us came Across Country to be a Witness. Smith is a all Woman's College and lodging is more big homes on a city campus than dorms that might look like apartments. More Victorian and Federalist styles. Quite nice, but that makes parking a special effort. Parking enforcement is strict.

This campus was beautiful and inviting. The botanical garden was an incredible teaching space.read more