Williston possesses a specific character that exudes passion and community bond that shines beyond the vital endowment.
The Admissions building is home to both the admissions and financial aid departments. Its close cousin, the Schoolhouse, right down Payson Ave., contains the business office in its basement. Deep within the ranks of these two pertinent buildings holds the key to what, where, when, why, and how tuition and its management are controlled.
Williston Northampton, founded Williston Seminary, has graced Easthampton with its picturesque campus since 1841. The one hundred-and-twenty-seven-acre campus boasts an impressive athletics facility, classic New England brick dorms, along with some new residential additions akin to a neighborhood home, and several academic buildings, all funded by the sixty-million-dollar endowment. In addition to alumni donations, full tuition-students oil the machine that is The Williston Northampton School, Mr. Holden as the source, bringing up the elephant in the room: how does the school tick? Under the guidance of Chief Financial Advisor (CFO) Peter L. Holden, tuition is directed towards many facets of campus in order to function.
Mr. Holden described tuition in two facets, both going “into the general operating fund for the school, along with all other revenue generated” and “used to support all the school’s payroll (i.e. salaries) and non-payroll expenses (i.e. supplies, utilities, services).”
Williston does not raise the same amount of money through alumni donations as, say, NMH, whose January 2025 donation from a former Pfizer exec totaled $50 million, according to WAMC public radio station. Mr. Peter Holden stated Williston’s “net tuition is our largest revenue source, so it pays for much of our expenses, including faculty and staff salaries.” Williston draws 77.4% of the school’s revenue from tuition and “16.4% comes from annual fund gifts and endowment draw, and the remaining 6.2% comes from auxiliary and cash management revenue.”
The recent building project of new dorms that included EMV was an extremely large endeavor for many, many years in the marking. In the typical academic year, the school commits “$700k from the operating fund, to support capital projects across the campus” said Holden.
Chris Dietrich is Williston’s Dean of Enrollment Management. In regards to tuition, Dietrich curates an approach to admission by balancing the number of students paying full tuition versus those on aid at any level. The school reads “all applicants without regard to their need for financial assistance,” and does their “best every year to utilize the financial assistance budget that we have to accept as many students as we can on March 10th in order to create the most well-rounded and diverse student body that we can at Williston.”
It is “crucial to have all of the voices of the Admission Officers represented in that conversation,” said Dietrich, despite that “it is certainly more competitive to gain acceptance to Williston if a student and their family require financial assistance.”
While characterizing admissions to Williston is necessary, a deeper understanding of where the money goes is essential to find answers. Tuition dollars are only a piece of the puzzle: alumni donations predominate for the average peer institution, inferred from a conversation The Willistonian had with Holden. The endowment of Williston—$60,376,102—is below the average private school endowment for Massachusetts ($106 million, according to Private School Review) and appears insignificant compared to top peer institutions: Deerfield possessing $920 million, says Wikipedia; Northfield Mount Hermon with $229 million, according to NMH’s website, and nearby Berkshire at $193 million.
Endowment links to tuition cost, and because Williston has a smaller comparative endowment, tuition is greater than peer institutions, totaling $79,500. Deerfield is $71,700 for boarders, $74,826 to live on campus for NMH, and Berkshire is $76,100 to board.
A significant amount of Williston’s allure resides in highly-academically-achieving students that excel at sports. For example, the Girls’ Varsity Hockey team, coached by Christa Talbot, has won the NEPSAC title—twice in the last four years—against powerhouses St. Paul’s and Andover, which possess endowments considerably larger than Williston’s. Boys Varsity Basketball captured a NEPSAC class A title, beating Exeter, which has 19 times the amount of assets, liquid or otherwise (an overall endowment of $1.15 billion, according to Business Insider), compared to Williston.
Similar to other boarding schools, not much admission information is included on the school’s website. Third-party sites, such as Niche, rank and describe boarding schools, along with other public and private secondary schools, colleges, or anything in between, which places Williston as the #69 best boarding school in American. A noteworthy statistic, which describes the school on the Niche website is “89% of students and parents agree that students at this school are athletic.”
Invigorating energy protrudes though the Williston campus, and an extremely customizable academic schedule to fit your needs, begs the question whether it is worth it to attend a “top-tier” boarding school, sacrificing many more hours on schoolwork, clubs, and athletic activities, to hopefully receive an acceptance letter from a blue-chip school, or is Williston the perfect balance of the two?
Tuition can also be out of the students’ hands, as financial aid packages may dictate whether an institution is plausible. For the student with opportunities to study at any boarding school, it remains important to why Williston was their choice. Did a lack of acceptance from more highly-regarded boarding schools lead the full-tuition student to find a place at Williston, or was a school with better college matriculation not chosen because of overwhelming academic requirements? The second part of the previous question may be flawed, because Williston has placed several of its students—who relied strictly on academic and extracurricular activities—at top institutions, including two to Yale University.
Williston retains talented faculty, including an accomplished English department with several published authors. Introducing the University of Pennsylvania Fellow program may further heighten the academic commitment of Williston, included in the academic programs of other boarding schools, including, but not limited to, Loomis, NMH, and Taft.
The UPenn Fellow program allows for the graduate student to achieve their master’s in teaching, attending classes and teaching courses at either a boarding or day independent school for two years. Williston has its own fellows program, funded completely by alumni, says Dean of Academics Kim Polin.
“It’s an interesting thing to know alumni can really impact community,” and “incredible” to see the young fellows “grow…as young independent school educators,” Polin said.
Williston’s incubator fellows program does not include a master’s program, instead focusing exclusively on the development of fellows. Karla Schaffer, Chris Pelliccia, and Tom Johnson “meet regularly [with the three fellows],” Mrs. Schaffer and Mr. Pelliccia work with the two new members of the Science department, Sarah Sullivan and Taylor Russ, and Mr. Johnson with Veronika Bedard, the history fellow. The three faculty and three fellows “[meet] regularly,” said Polin.
The ins-and-outs of tuition are commanded by Holden, the upper school admissions work Dietrich, the academics by Polin, along with a myriad of impressive, talented financial aid members of the administration—Director of Admission and Financial Aid Lee Greener at the helm—illustrating the gel of the Williston community is not bravado, it is collaboration.
