New Marlborough boarding school stressing innovation has 15 in first graduating class

MARLBOROUGH — In the fall of 2021, 15 students began taking a chance on a very different approach to high school. Now they're on the cusp of graduating from an innovative program that aims to change the model of contemporary education.

"At NEIA, you can either do nothing, or you can do all of the things you ever wanted," said Hans-Peter Hansen, a senior from Chatham.

"NEIA" stands for the New England Innovation Academy, an independent private school founded in 2021 at a former Verizon call center on Locke Drive. The school launched with 75 students, the oldest of whom were 10th graders and who would go on to become its first graduating class. The school since has expanded its footprint, now enrolling 150 students across middle and high school.

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NEIA doesn't provide traditional grading or curriculum, nor does it offer AP courses. Instead, students focus on innovation, project management and collaboration, using technology and other tools to focus on what administrators consider to be an evolving form of education.

It isn't cheap. NEIA’s published tuition rates for 2023-24 for day students are $44,150 for grades 7-8 and $48,730 for grades 9-12, according to the school website; rates for residential students are $67,050 for grades 7-8 and $71,630 for grades 9-12.

"Too many schools look backward at the traditions and cultures of what was, at what is often called the factory model of education, where rote learning in rows, obedience and compliance seems to be the order of the day," said Tom Woelper, NEIA's Head of School. "This is a school where our founders really believe that school is more about preparing students accurately for this changing world. A vision that is not stuck in the cultural inertia that a lot of schools are."

NEIA puts focus on applying skills, creative and entrepreneurial thinking

One example of such applied learning occurred when students worked on real designs for a roller-skating company, including engaging in a real pitch meeting with company executives. NEIA's campus includes a room specifically designed for student entrepreneurship, where students draw up contracts and work collaboratively on real-world business models.

"Too much education is focused on content mastery and regurgitation," Woelper said. "I think there's a certain reality where content is always going to be important, but there needs to be a certain focus toward skills, application mindsets and dispositions."

Students who are set to graduate this spring pointed out that NEIA differs from other schools in that its discovery-based learning model allows them to integrate their own interests into their education.

"When I was first introduced to NEIA, I saw that it was such a unique learning style," said senior Catherine Martz, a Michigan resident and one 45 students who board at the school. "It was very interesting to see how you could follow your passion through school, which was something that I wasn't able to do at any of my other schools. I was able to try new things — I got a chance to create a vegetarian cookbook as part of a project last year, and it was really cool to be able to make food that I'm passionate about, and have that be for a class."

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When the Class of 2024 started at NEIA — which opened right after the peak of the pandemic — the school still had more growing to do. It lacked robust athletic fields, a lecture hall and various extracurricular activities. Slowly, those programs have been added, often at the request of students who took initiative themselves.

"There were a couple of juniors that started at NEIA this year, and they had come from another school that had a varsity robotics team," said Darshan Balaji, a senior from Burlington. "They had a huge passion for it and they wanted to start a team, so they did and last week the team qualified for the world championship event in Houston."

NEIA official says school requires students to advocate for themselves

Assistant Head of School Ben Farrell said NEIA requires students to advocate for themselves more than in other educational programs, which helps them learn important life skills.

"I think to be a really good student at NEIA, you have to be able to advocate for yourself, and that seems like a very basic thing, but at every school I've worked at, everyone talks about how to find ways to teach kids to empower students," he said. "But here, these students, they have a real voice and we listen to them. If a student comes to me and says they have a thought about something, I'm going to listen and we're going to try and work on something like that. The idea of being innovative, and having that innovative spirit, runs throughout all of us."

Senior year would prove to be a major test for not only the Class of 2024, but NEIA in general, as students began to apply for college. Given the school's nontraditional model, it remained to be seen how interested colleges would be in NEIA's students.

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"The college process can often be very difficult at a lot of schools, the class can be cagey and competitive," Farrell said. "At this school, they all had each other's back and were very supportive, because they knew they were going through something that was unique together — they knew the only other people in the world that knew what they were going through was that class of 15."

The results would suggest that NEIA achieved a major success, with all members of the graduating class getting accepted into such colleges as New York University, the University of Michigan and the Savannah College of Art and Design.

'We really talk about passion and purpose'

"One advantage we saw is that if you go to a school that has a real traditional curriculum, you will be compared to other schools that have a traditional curriculum," Woelper said. "Our kids don't look like those students. We really talk about passion and purpose, experience-based learning, and we talk about the ability to start your own company, or found your own robotics team that just qualified for the world championship.

"And colleges are responding."

Besides providing unique resumes for college, the education at NEIA provided useful feedback to allow students to decide what they're interested in pursuing.

Jack Antonangeli, a senior from Lancaster, said he came to NEIA after attending a Montessori school through eighth grade, then spending ninth grade learning online. He said his time at NEIA gave him valuable information on how he wants to pursue his education after graduating.

"One of the things I realized while attending NEIA was that I really don't want to be working a traditional 9-to-5 job," Antonangeli said. "So I'm going to take a gap year and try some different things. I'm going to start by working on a farm this summer. When I figure out what I want to pursue, I'm going to attend Hampshire College."

This article originally appeared on MetroWest Daily News: Marlborough innovation academy has 15 students first graduating class