Dana Hall School - Student Life

Student Life

Extra-curricular activities include more than 20 student clubs at Dana Hall, including Hallmanac (student newspaper), Focus (yearbook), Best Buddies, Community Service Advisory Board, Chamber Singers, K2K (peer tutoring), and Outing Club. In addition to on-campus dances, movies, concerts and student performances, weekends feature faculty-chaperoned off-campus outings, from the local mall to Boston art museums and sporting events, to overnight trips to New York.

Boarding

Boarding students in grades 9-12 live in one of six dormitories on campus, which are supervised by house directors, house assistants, and student proctors. To strengthen the community, all day students and faculty members have a dorm affiliation. The affiliate program brings together boarders and day students along with the faculty for overnights, cookouts, outings into Boston, and late night snacks.

Community Service

Dana Hall is committed to community service as part of a complete academic and social education. The Community Service Program encourages involvement with people both in and beyond the school community. The program fosters concern for the environment through school-wide service projects and through the activities of clubs, classes, and individuals. The Community Service Coordinator, with the help of student leaders, plans individual and group projects and facilitates communication about community service throughout the school. The student Community Service Advisory Board plans and leads outreach projects to local shelters, hospitals, and other organizations.

Athletics

Dana Hall fields competitive teams in basketball, cross-country, fencing, field hockey, golf, ice hockey, lacrosse, riding, soccer, softball, squash, swimming, tennis, and volleyball. In 2009-10 Dana Hall won three Eastern Independent League (EIL) titles in varsity field hockey, swimming, and softball. Students and faculty also benefit from use of the 93,000-square-foot (8,600 m2) Shipley Center for Athletics, Health and Wellness, which aims to strengthen Dana Hall's expanding sports program and integrate the School's health and wellness programs.

The Riding Center

The horseback-riding program at Dana Hall has been available for students since the 1930s and has grown to be one of the school's most popular attractions. There are two indoor riding arenas, one outdoor arena, a main barn area with an office and tack room, a second indoor barn for all the horses, and outdoor paddocks. Lessons and boarding for privately-owned horses are available. The barn stables forty-five horses with about half being for daily school use and the other half being privately owned.

Students in the high school are offered the option to take horseback riding as their spring, winter, or fall sport. The Dana Hall Interscholastic Equestrian Team was established in 2002. Both middle and upper school students are able to join the team and compete against other teams in their Zone (Zone 1). A Therapeutic Riding program is also provided at the Riding Center. The program helps disabled children gain confidence, strength, and problem solving skills. It also offers Dana Hall students a way to partake in community service on the school's campus.

Travel and Exchange Dana Hall students have a unique opportunity to take part in an educational program away from our campus in Wellesley. Programs include School-Year Abroad (China, France, Italy and Spain); the High Mountain Institute in Colorado; exchange program with Ruyton Girls' School in Australia; and The School for Ethics and Global Leadership in Washington, D.C.

Traditions

Traditions are a part of life at Dana Hall. There are several Step-Sings throughout the year when the students all gather together to celebrate and sing their class song. During the fall there is Senior-Sophomore, where the seniors are assigned a sophomore whom they take care of for the week, giving them colorful posters and small gifts. At the end of the week, the seniors each dress up their sophomore in a fun-spirited costume then reveal themselves to the sophomores, forming a bond that lasts much longer than just the year.

Revels is a play written by Dana faculty, and each December the junior class performs it for the whole school in celebration of the winter solstice and to kick off the winter vacation. As a way to introduce themselves to the school, the freshman class performs a talent show called Cabaret every year. And finally there is the Mid-Winter tradition, a completely secret tradition that occurs between the juniors and seniors. All is known is that juniors receive their class rings.