St. Andrew’s SchoolST. ANDREW’S SCHOOL · PRIVATE SCHOOL GUIDE
St. Andrew’s is an Episcopal boarding school of 320 students on 2,200 acres in Middletown, Delaware. For fall 2027, it takes new students in grades 9, 10, and 11. Start here to picture daily life and prepare each part of your application.
Fall 2027 entry
GET TO KNOW THE SCHOOL
St. Andrew’s calls grades 9 to 12 the III, IV, V, and VI Forms. You take five or six academic courses each semester.
IN CLASS
English classes are built on student discussion and repeated writing. English 2 ends with a 30-minute oral exhibition, and senior tutorials have six students or fewer.
IN YOUR DORM
Grades 9 to 11 live by gender and grade. Seniors live across the dorms as residential leaders, with a dorm parent and three or four other faculty in each dorm.
IN THE AFTERNOON
In grades 9 and 10, at least two of your activities each year must be athletic, and in grades 11 and 12 at least one. Managing a team doesn’t count.
Your Big is a senior paired with you. Advisers usually meet their advisees at least once a week and stay in contact with parents, and after your first year you choose your own adviser.
Entry points: New students join in grades 9, 10, and 11, in the fall only. There’s no spring entry, no grade 12 entry, and no postgraduate year. The application for grade 10 or 11 is nearly the same as for grade 9.
How many join: In a typical year, St. Andrew’s admits 15 to 20 new sophomores (grade 10) and up to six new juniors (grade 11).
Placement: New students take math placement exams, and the science department decides on honors placement.
Grade 10 courses: Everyone in grade 10 takes Religious Thought and a semester of health and wellness, so if you join in grade 10, both come in your first year.
History: You need a year and a half, including the Advanced Study Research Seminar and, if your earlier school didn’t teach U.S. history, a semester focused on the U.S.
A language: Joining in grade 10, you study one language other than your native one for two years at St. Andrew’s or through level three, whichever takes you further. Joining in grade 11, it’s one year there or through level three, again whichever takes you further.
The arts: One semester, or approved involvement in a performing ensemble instead.
School sports: Transferring can affect your eligibility under the rules of the DIAA (the Delaware Interscholastic Athletic Association), so ask the admission office how the rules apply to you.
English and math: Four years of each, including senior English. Ask how courses from your earlier school will count.
Science: Three years, covering biology, physics, and chemistry.
Religion, philosophy, and wellness: A year and a half of religion and philosophy, including Religious Thought in grade 10, and a semester of health and wellness that year.
If you join in grade 9: Two and a half years of history, including U.S. history and the Advanced Study Research Seminar; three years of one language other than your native one at St. Andrew’s; and a year and a half of the arts.
Languages: Latin, Greek, Chinese, French, and Spanish. Greek is a sequence of semester electives rather than a yearlong track, and each course has its own prerequisites.
Going further: Advanced Study courses appear throughout the catalog, and some courses prepare students for AP (Advanced Placement) exams.
Health care: The Health Center is staffed around the clock while school is in session, and over three long weekends. Counseling is by appointment.
Help with your work: St. Andrew’s offers academic advisers, coaching in planning and organizing your work, help with writing and with each subject, tutoring from teachers and other students, and supervised study hall. Testing can lead to a shared learning plan and approved accommodations.
Outside tutors: During term, students may not work with outside tutors, or with outside coaches for planning and organizing. Vacations are the exception.
UNDERSTAND WHAT ST. ANDREW’S LOOKS FOR
It reads your grades, test scores, recommendations, essays, and interview, and it doesn’t use quotas by country for international applicants.
YOUR CURIOSITY
St. Andrew’s describes the students it looks for as “academically motivated, adventurous, curious.”
Letrado’s adviceBring one example of following your curiosity, like a book you tracked down after class or a question you put to someone who knew more. Say exactly what you did next.
YOUR READINESS TO BOARD
St. Andrew’s looks for applicants who are ready for boarding life.
Letrado’s adviceThink of a week you organized mostly on your own, such as a school trip or a summer program, and be ready to say how you managed it.
YOUR ENGLISH
St. Andrew’s expects nearly native fluency for discussion and group work, and it has no ESL (English as a Second Language) program.
Letrado’s adviceIf English isn’t your first language, talk through what you read in English every week, with an adult who asks follow-up questions.
WHAT ST. ANDREW’S DESCRIBES
September to December, while school is in session
Mid-September to mid-January
Send the inquiry form first, then book by phone or email. If you ask for an online interview after December 15, St. Andrew’s can’t promise you one.
Applying from mainland China? If you can’t visit, St. Andrew’s requires an interview through Vericant, an outside interview provider, before December 15, and it may ask you for a follow-up in January. Planning to visit in person? Ask whether you still need Vericant.
Preview tours for future applicants don’t include an interview.
WHAT ST. ANDREW’S ASKS FOR
The SSAT (Secondary School Admission Test), at the Upper Level
The ISEE (Independent School Entrance Examination), or for grades 10 and 11, the PSAT or SAT
The PSAT (the Preliminary SAT) leads up to the SAT, a U.S. college-admission test. St. Andrew’s sets no minimum score, but its successful international applicants typically score above the 90th percentile on the SSAT and above 110 on the TOEFL, an English test, on its 0–120 scale.
The TOEFL moved to a 1–6 scale on January 21, 2026, and also reports a 0–120 score during a two-year changeover.
Score codes: SSAT 6280, ISEE 571716, and TOEFL 8146.
ST. ANDREW’S 2026–27 SCHEDULE AND HANDBOOK
In grades 9 to 11, phones are handed in during study hall and after lights-out. Calls home fit between the end of study hall and in-room time, when you have to be in your room.
Student councils plan the weekends. Clubs are optional and run by students, each with a faculty adviser: Model UN, robotics, the literary journal, and the newspaper are among them.
ST. ANDREW’S PUBLISHED FIGURES
The new-student figures describe a typical year, not the places open for fall 2027.
PLAN THE APPLICATION
Gateway to Prep Schools and the Standard Application Online (SAO) are two applications many private schools share. St. Andrew’s has no preference. Decisions come on March 10.
Application
Jan 15, 2027Decisions
Mar 10Your reply
Apr 10Dates without a year are as St. Andrew’s lists them. Ask the admission office when your teachers and school can start sending your recommendations and grades for fall 2027.
On Gateway, the fee is $60, or $120 for international applicants. SAO adds a $10 processing fee to the school’s fee. If your family earns under $150,000, ask the admission office to waive the fee once you’ve sent the inquiry form, and SAO’s $10 goes too.
From your current English and math teachers and your principal or counselor. Your school sends this year’s grades and earlier ones. A personal or special-interest letter, or one from another adult, is optional. Files that are complete by January 31 get their decision on March 10.
On Gateway, St. Andrew’s asks for its Student Activities and Essays section and a Parent Statement. You’ll find the questions inside the application.
Required for every applicant. Send the inquiry form, then book by phone or email: on campus from September to December, or online from mid-September to mid-January.
Required. The SSAT counts for every grade, so ask before you send any other test. You may need an English test too.
Choose one: St. Andrew’s takes either, with no preference. Don’t submit both.
Gateway, in three parts: Part 1, the Candidate Profile, can go to several schools, and to change one school’s copy, you unlink it first. Submit Part 1, and pay the fee if you’re paying online, before you submit Part 2, St. Andrew’s own section. In Part 3, you request recommendations and records, and your teachers and school complete them.
SAO: A parent or guardian opens the account for a student under 18. Submitted forms are final: SAO can remove a form sent by mistake within ten business days, but you can’t rewrite or add to your answers.
Your grade: Choose the grade you’re applying for before you add St. Andrew’s in Gateway, and contact the admission office if it has to change.
After January 15: St. Andrew’s considers late applications for its waitlist or for places still open, so contact the admission office first. Send updates or questions by email or phone.
English tests: If English isn’t your first language and your schooling hasn’t been mainly in English, plan on the TOEFL. Want to take the IELTS, another English test, instead? Ask the admission office first. Native English speakers, and students at international or American schools that teach mainly in English, don’t need a test. At a bilingual school? Ask whether yours counts.
English support: There’s no ESL program, so build your English before you arrive.
Health insurance: You need proof of coverage. St. Andrew’s international plan doesn’t cover care in your home country. U.S. citizens living abroad can join the domestic plan, but dual citizens living abroad may belong in the international one, so check which applies.
Breaks: Campus closes for Thanksgiving, winter, spring, and summer breaks. If you can’t go home, ask early where you could stay.
Travel: Before you travel home, get your I-20 signed: it’s the form you need for an F-1 student visa. In 2026–27, students under 15 can have an escort for air travel, with seven days’ notice, at $25 an hour plus a travel charge. Ask which airport to use for international flights before you book.
Arrival: In 2026, international families had an orientation on August 28, the day before school opened, and pickups from Philadelphia’s airport or Wilmington’s train station had to be booked at least a week ahead. Check the 2027 dates before you book flights.
Ask early: Ask the admission office how new international students get their I-20 and what proof of funds it needs, whether you’ll need a guardian in the U.S., and whether your documents need translating.
WRITE IN YOUR OWN VOICE
The questions are inside your applicationYou’ll see the essay questions and the Parent Statement, with any word limits, in Gateway or SAO once you start.
St. Andrew’s tells applicants it would rather see a real story, and how you’ve grown, than polished perfection. Your teachers write their own recommendations, and your parents write their own statement.
Letrado’s adviceWrite every draft yourself, and keep the moments where you changed your mind. If English isn’t your first language, don’t run a draft through a translation tool: the English has to be yours too. Our mentors ask questions and show you where a reader might get lost, but we never write or rewrite your words, or your parents’ statement.
Read every question, and any limit, before you start. Then pick a moment when a habit or an opinion of yours changed, and tell it the way it happened.
Give honest hours and years for each. One commitment you’ve kept for years says more than a long list of things you tried once.
This is the one part of your application written by the people who live with you, so ask them to use plain, everyday words.
Gateway’s Candidate Profile asks you to certify that your materials are “factually accurate and honestly presented,” and false information can cost you your place. On SAO, the parent who opens the account agrees to give “truthful, complete, up-to-date and accurate information.” Once you’re a student, St. Andrew’s 2026–27 handbook bans generative AI, grammar tools, and online translators on schoolwork unless your teacher allows them for that assignment. Our rule: AI can help you brainstorm, check spelling and grammar, or understand a topic, but every sentence you submit is yours, with no AI-written or AI-rewritten text and no details AI made up. If St. Andrew’s, Gateway, or SAO sets its own rule, follow it, and our mentors will too.
MAKE ROOM FOR THE FINANCIAL QUESTION
St. Andrew’s announced these terms on September 28, 2026. All its aid is based on need, with no merit scholarships, and it says it admits students without regard to their family’s means.
U.S. HOUSEHOLDS UNDER $150,000
if your assets are in line with your income and you have two years of W-2 income (the wage statements U.S. employers issue) that can be verified.
U.S. HOUSEHOLDS, $150,000 TO $350,000
Your assets, the cost of living where you live, and other children’s tuition also affect the assessment.
INTERNATIONAL FAMILIES
in nearly all cases, under St. Andrew’s aid policy, and only a limited number of international students receive aid.
St. Andrew’s also says it meets the full demonstrated need of the students it admits. Living outside the U.S.? Ask the aid office whether that or the 50% limit applies to your family, and whether asking for aid affects admission. Living in the U.S. without citizenship, a U.S. citizen abroad, or self-employed? Ask whether the U.S. terms cover you.
St. Andrew’s new aid terms (opens in a new tab)PUBLISHED 2026–27 TUITION · ALL BOARDING
$78,500Everyone boards, so there’s one price. Health insurance, travel, and a $250 spending-account advance come on top, and you’ll need your own laptop.
For fall 2027 entry, use the 2027–28 tuition and insurance prices when St. Andrew’s publishes them.
Tuition and financial aid (opens in a new tab)Letrado’s adviceApply for aid with your application if there’s any chance you’ll need it: in the U.S., the new terms reach households earning up to $350,000. Outside the U.S., ask the aid office what it could offer before you count on it.
For families with high need, aid can also help with books, travel, and technology.
What the new aid covers (opens in a new tab)ADMITTED TO ST. ANDREW’S · M.B.
She was applying for grade 10 from a bilingual school near Paris, speaking French and Arabic at home and studying partly in English. Relatives kept advising her to follow her older brother’s path, and teachers had over-edited her English essays into polished, distant prose. We helped her edit for clarity without erasing her voice.
She wrote about family memories without turning them into academic research.
No relative’s story went in without her own judgment about privacy.
Some sentences were simplified, while culturally specific expressions stayed when their meaning was clear.
St. Andrew’s answers for international applicants (opens in a new tab) say it has no ESL program and expects nearly native fluency for discussion. Aim for precise English that still sounds like you.
AI illustrationSt. Andrew’s SchoolHER ST. ANDREW’S OUTCOME
Offered a place at St. Andrew’s School
HER CHOICE: ST. ANDREW’SFront lawn, St. Andrew’s School · Photo: Clemens Robinson / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0. Cropped.
Discussion there felt less like a performance to her. She didn’t need to out-achieve her brother. She needed a place where her own habits could be seen.
ALSO ADMITTED TO
WHEN YOU’D LIKE A HAND
Bring your questions to a free 45-minute introduction with your proposed mentor. Afterward, we’ll email a personalized plan with recommended next steps.
