I spent three years in two different military schools, Riverside Military Academy and Kemper Military school. The differences and traditions of the two schools got me fascinated with how different military schools do things and how they’ve evolved over the years. Sounds like something someone should write a book about.
But anyway, anyone else go to a military school for high school? Where did you go, how was it? Riverside is a good school, they were the real deal. Kemper on the other hand was not and they went out of business in 2002. Seems like these institutions are hit or miss from what I’ve heard. Some are great, others are Lord of the Flies, with kids abusing each other with little adult supervision.
My stepfather kept threatening me with that when I was just in elementary school. I started vomiting in the mornings and my mother took me to the doc to see what was up. I think he may have told her that it was partly stress, and that she in turn told my stepfather to knock it the fuck off or he’d be packing his shit, because it stopped soon after that.
My brother went to Greenbrier Military School in West Virginia. He spent a year or two there before the school closed permanently. (It wasn’t his fault) My uncles were the director of food services and executive chef. He wasn’t a “bad kid” - I think my parents offered it to him because my uncles’ employment got them a break on tuition, since the uncles had daughters, not sons.
Bad kids shouldn’t be sent to military school in any case. One of the biggest problems I noticed with the idea of military school is that the reputation of military schools is not really the reality. It’s not a place to send bad kids. It’s actually more for kids who are interested in the military aspect, or kids who are good kids but just need more structure and discipline. Sending a bad kid to military school is dangerous. If he’s a bully, he’ll find plenty of victims, and now they LIVE with him. If he’s into drugs or drinking he’ll find plenty of that too. Parents are under the impression that military schools are better supervised than their own home and that’s not the case. It’s a LOT less supervised and it’s far more easy to get into bad things if your mind is already set on doing that. But if you’re the type of kid who generally tries to do the right thing, but just haven’t had good direction in your life, you can thrive in that environment.
